Arizona Violent Crime Down, Except Under Tough Anti-Immigration Sheriff

First Posted: 07/14/10 03:34 PM ET Updated: 05/25/11 06:05 PM ET 

A chart circulated by a leading immigration reform organization makes a basic, but compelling case that the new law passed -- though not implemented -- in Arizona could cause an increase rather than a drop in crime.
The non-profit group America's Voice sent out a chart on Wednesday, documenting the change in violent crime levels in various Arizona police jurisdictions from 2002 through 2009. The numbers tell two interesting stories.
The first is that, by and large, crime is down across the board. In Arizona as a whole, it has dropped 12 percent in the past seven years. But in major Maricopa County cities with their own police forces -- Phoenix, Mesa, Scottsdale and Tempe -- the rate has dropped even faster. (The group measured within Maricopa County because it is the epicenter of the immigration debate. But in Tuscon, which is not in the county, there has also been a drop in the crime rate since 2002, according to law enforcement statistics).


ArizonaCrime


Those findings alone suggest that the systemic violence often cited as the compelling argument for stricter border laws may be overblown.
But the more telling number may be the crime statistics for the portion of Maricopa County that is under the purview of controversial Sheriff Joe Arpaio. According to data compiled by America's Voice, crime in that area has actually increased 58 percent since 2002.
Arpaio is considered something of a visionary among conservatives with respect to his approach to immigration. Many of his reforms, indeed, have served as a basis for the law that Gov. Jan Brewer tried to implement statewide. But he has clashed with other sheriffs over his methods, with some complaining that such broad anti-immigration policies put an overwhelming burden on law enforcement officials while producing social friction rather than safety.

America's Voice's chart isn't perfect. For one, Arpaio's domain is much smaller than those of the major cities within the county. Crime as a whole remains lower under his watch than, say, in Phoenix (only it's increasing as opposed to decreasing over time). Moreover, not every factor responsible for the violent crime level can or should be tied to immigration.
But the group's underlying point is that the discussion around immigration policy both in Arizona and the United States at large needs to be reoriented. And the raw percentages of violent crime statistics shown in the chart have that effect.

 

Sam Stein stein@huffingtonpost.com

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Three of the Biggest Lies Republicans Tell About Themselves

Three of the Biggest Lies Republicans Tell About Themselves

November 25, 2013 By Allen Clifton  

 

When I talk with Republicans, I often feel like I’m speaking with someone who lives inside of a bubble where the outside world and all of its realities are simply unable to penetrate.  It’s the school teacher who votes Republican despite Republicans stripping teachers unions of collective bargaining power.  It’s the individual who’s soon to rely on Medicare and Social Security, claiming they don’t need the federal government.  The person on welfare who voted for the politician who just voted to cut their benefits.
But one area where Republicans excel at is propaganda.  They’re really good at it.  They’ve successfully convinced millions of people to be absolute hypocrites, vote against their own interests and believe that giving rich people more money benefits the rest of us.
Basically, they’ve convinced people to lie to themselves.
So I decided I would give a quick rundown of three of the bigger lies Republicans perpetuate about themselves (though there are far more than three).
1) They’re fiscally conservative 
This is probably the biggest joke of them all.  It’s amazing to me that this is real platform they actually run on, yet haven’t had a Republican president who’s actually balanced the budget since President Eisenhower in the 1950′s.  Hell, their “conservative hero” Ronald Reagan came close to quadrupling the national debt during his eight years.  How exactly is someone a “beacon for fiscal responsibility” when they almost quadrupled the national debt?
And I know some conservatives will do what they always do and blame Democrats for Reagan running up our national debt.  I love reading the asinine conclusion that the near quadrupling of our debt was the fault of Tip O’Neill, not Reagan.  I hate to break it to these people, but Reagan signed off on every single piece of legislation during his eight years in office that led to the massive growth of our national debt.  Congressional Democrats couldn’t simply enact legislation without Reagan’s approval.
Then again, conservatives who make this argument clearly don’t understand how government works.  They’re also the ones who give all of the credit for our balanced  budget in the 90′s to congressional Republicans.
Then look at George W. Bush.  He took a balanced budget and completely wrecked it.  It took him one year to send us back into deficits after President Clinton gave us a surplus.  And don’t even tell me that our budget surplus should be credited to the Republicans in Congress.  If they were the primary reason why we had a balanced budget, it would have continued after Clinton left the White House, when they were still in charge of Congress — but guess what?  It didn’t.
What Bush did was cut taxes, then started two wars.  That’s like buying an $80,000 sports car just after taking a massive pay cut at work.  He reduced our revenue then increased our spending.  How again is that being “fiscally conservative”?
The only area Republicans point to for this claim of “fiscal responsibility” is their opposition to tax hikes.  But guess what?  Cutting taxes has nothing to do with being smart with money.
Oh, but they’ll cut programs that help the poor and the needy, that’ll balance our budget, right?  But you damn sure better not mention cutting oil subsidies or closing tax loopholes for the rich — Republicans will have no part in eliminating either of those.
The only place Republicans are fiscally conservative is in their minds.
2) Small government 
This is another joke.  I love how the party which actively campaigns for president on the pretense of passing Constitutional Amendments that would define traditional marriage is somehow the party of “small government.”
Or the party that continues to pass laws in Republican-controlled states attacking the right for a woman to have an abortion, requiring ultrasounds or transvaginal probes before an abortion can be performed.  That’s small government? 
Hell, if they had their way there would still be a ban on homosexuals in the military.
The fact is, Republicans love government.  Well, as long as that government is supporting something they want.  The only time they’re advocates for “small government” is when the government forces them to do things like — give people civil rights.
I live in Texas, a highly Republican state, where you can’t even buy liquor on Sunday due to outdated laws passed decades ago.  Hell, there are some counties in Texas where you still can’t buy alcohol at all.  How “small government” of them.  Isn’t Texas supposed to be a beacon for “small government values”?  Right.
The truth is, Republicans love government when they can use it to try to enforce their bigotry and ignorance, but hate government when it prevents them from enforcing their bigotry and ignorance.
3) Pro-life 
Being anti-abortion doesn’t make you “pro-life.”  Just like supporting the right for a woman to have an abortion doesn’t make you “pro-abortion.”
Republicans constantly prove that they don’t give a crap about life the moment it’s out of the womb.  Sure, they’ll use a fetus to stir up anger within people to get votes, but the fact of the matter is once that baby is born — they couldn’t care less.
The GOP has consistently cut funding for programs that help the poor and the needy.  They’ve strongly stood against access to health care for all Americans.  There’s even a push now by many to privatize Medicare and Social Security so that these programs are handed over to greedy corporations that can gamble with the future of millions of Americans.
There are tens of millions of children who will have less to eat this holiday because of the Republican cuts to our nation’s SNAP program.  And if Republicans get their way, tens of billions more will be cut from the program.
In a state like Texas — where millions of its citizens go without health care — Rick Perry refused to expand Medicaid coverage so that millions of Texans could receive health care, some for the very first time.  This is a practice we’ve seen all over the country in many Republican-controlled states.
How “pro-life” of these Republicans to deny access to health care for millions of Americans who desperately need it.
And the sad fact is, Republicans only really “care” about a fetus because it helps them get votes.  Otherwise they wouldn’t oppose — and cut — funding to programs that would help millions of poor children all across the United States.
When Republicans say they’re “pro-life” all they really mean is they’re anti-abortion — that’s it.  To call Republicans “pro-life” is an absolute joke.  Because once that baby is born, they couldn’t care less what happens to it, as long as it votes Republican in 18 years.
Now of course these aren’t the only ways Republicans lie to themselves.  These are just three of the bigger “labels” they give themselves that I find completely absurd.
But I’m sure to any Republican reading this, I’m absolutely wrong.  Sure I am.  Of course, they’ve most likely never voted for a Republican president who’s balanced the budget, they probably support a Constitutional Amendment banning same-sex marriage, and you can bet they support massive cuts to welfare programs that feed millions of poor children.
Like I said, it’s like they live in a delusional bubble that reality is simply unable to penetrate.

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Survey: Low IQ Leads To Racism And Extreme Conservatism

By Maeby Gever on November 24, 2013

 Studies correlate low IQ with rabidly racist and right-wing views.

Studies correlate low IQ with rabidly racist and right-wing views

Does talking to a Teabully leave you asking: What’s wrong with this person? Do Teabully posts and memes make you wonder if people, who believe those things, could be cray-cray?   Take heart! A 2012 Canadian study suggests conservatives with racist and extreme views just might be born that way.

Psychology Today featured psychologists Gordon Hodson and Michael A. Busseri’s findings in its April 22 issue. Hodson and Busseri work at Borck University in St. Catherine’s, Ontario, Canada. They concluded the following:

Lower intelligence in childhood  is predictive of greater racism in adulthood, with this effect being mediated (partially explained) through conservative ideology.

and

Poor abstract reasoning skills were related to homophobic attitudes which was mediated through authoritarianism and low levels of intergroup contact.

and

For those who lack a cognitive ability to grasp complexities of our world, strict-right wing ideologies may be more appealing.” and “people with less cognitive capacity will be attracted to simplifying ideologies.

According to University of Virginia psychologist Brian Nosek:

Reality is complicated and messy…Ideologies get rid of the messiness and impose a simpler solution. So, it may not be surprising that people with less cognitive capacity will be attracted to simplifying ideologies.

And the studies making the connections to low IQ and to the racists and far right wing views–that seem to be at the root of the views expressed by the GOP/Teabully party of today–go back to 1970 and to 1958. Psychological studies have also linked a Conservative political point of view to an authoritarian upbringing.


Psychological studies have longed linked the appeal to political points of view, such as Fascism, to an authoritarian upbringing.  For a refresher course on “Isms,” grab the free downloadable primer available at LiberalAmerica.org.

The current rise of the Christian Right embedding itself into the present GOP/Teabully Party is proof that there’s a link between authoritarianism and these political points of view. The “Christian Fundamentalist Nation,” of which Teabullies dream, has been referred to as an ideology that is:

A form of debilitating shortsightedness. It replaces reality with an idealized version that usually has too little to do with the real world to be workable.

We should be careful not to conclude all liberals are smart and all right-wing conservative/Teabully types are stupid.  And, we must also be careful not take IQ tests at face value. They’ve long been suspected of being culturally biased. But, the studies connecting low IQs to racist, homophobic, bigoted, and conservative thinking are there.

Conservative Teabully types will no doubt scream and stomp, yelling, “Liberal bias!” That, of course, wouldn’t be surprising. They deny facts and have very little interest in science. But, like the Affordable Care Act and other legislation about which John Boehner’s GOP/Teabully House of Representatives whines, why bother?  It’s too hard, and reading is for Liberals.
About the Author:
Maeby Gever (45 Articles)I am the voice of my human parents. Dad, 58, mom 56, both retired lawyers. Dad worked privately as a personal injury lawyer in the Philadelphia, PA area before retirement. He has a BA in Political Science, a Masters in Secondary Social Studies Education and he did some public school teaching before retiring again. Mom also has a BA in Political Science and she spent her entire 33 year career working as an attorney for a US Defense Department Agency located in Philadelphia, PA. She spent the last four years of her career as the Chief Counsel. She retired in April of this year. I have two human brothers, both Graduates of the George Washington University. My older human brother is working his way up in Airport Management at the Philadelphia International Airport. My younger human brother is a Peace Corps veteran.

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Wal-Mart's Employee Food Drive

As the greedy underclass continues to demand a living wage, Wal-Mart generously hosts a food drive for its own employees.  (02:40)

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You Might Be Surprised Who Collects on the Tips You Leave at Restaurants

By law your tip is supposed to go to restaurant workers -- often they don't.

 

Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com/Rommel Canlas

November 17, 2013  |  

 

I was asked during a recent interview what happens to the tips we leave in restaurants. Do they actually go to the workers? I said they’re supposed to. Often they don't.
First, tips don't  only go to servers. They are typically shared—with bussers, runners, bartenders, floor captains, and more. These workers receive varying percentages of total tips on top of the abysmally low minimum hourly wage they receive for tipped labor—$2.13 at the federal level, and between $2 and $4 in most states. These workers live off low wages earned from their employers as well as the generosity given by their customers, who decide whether and how much to tip.
By law, restaurants are required to make up the difference between a server's hourly base pay and the federal minimum for all other workers, $7.25. That means restaurants are supposed to calculate how much servers make in tips and ensure that those tips exceed $7.25 per hour on average. This legally required business expense is offset by what's called a "tip credit"—a discount on workers' wages because we, the customers, are asked to pay workers' wages for restaurants.
Having to calculate whether tips actually bring workers' wages up to the federal minimum wage each week can put an incredible burden on small businesses. Unsurprisingly, the U.S. Department of Labor reports a violation rate of 84 percent with regard to the tip credit.
Worse, these workers' paltry earnings are often stolen.
One in five servers reports being forced to share tips with management, according to a national survey conducted by my organization. You might think that happens only with cash, not with credit cards. Think again. Restaurants often deduct credit card-processing fees from workers’ tips.
Philadelphia recently passed an ordinance banning the deduction of credit card-processing fees from tips. When the bill was being debated, a local restauranteur complained that he'd lose $500,000 annually. It was a rare case of unintended honesty. He had been skimming half a million dollars from his workers' tips. Sadly, Philadelphia is just one of a few places to ban tip-skimming.
Workers’ tips are stolen in other ways. One of our leaders, Claudia Munoz, tells the story of having worked at the IHOP in Houston while in graduate school. Her hourly base pay $2.13. The IHOP did not bother making sure that her tips brought her hourly wages up to the federal minimum. It reported that she was earning $7.25 an hour regardless of what she earned in tips. The result? No paycheck. Ever. The real $2.13 an hour paid the taxes on the fictional $7.25 an hour.
Claudia describes not being able to afford food, and being so hungry that she’d wait to get to the restaurant so she could flirt with cooks to get extra food. One evening, Claudia worked an overnight shift at the IHOP, and earned some decent tips. But at the end of the night, a couple walked out without paying the bill. The restaurant's management—though it is illegal—required Claudia to pay for the walkout, which was more than everything she earned that night.
Claudia paid $20 to work for nothing.
What can we do as tippers? First, leave tips in cash. Second, demand that tips go solely and directly to workers, and that workers be paid a full, stable, livable base wage. Don't continue subsidizing an industry that should be paying its own workers. No one should be living off tips.

Saru Jayaraman is the co-founder of the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, director of the Food Labor Research Center at UC Berkeley. She is the author of Behind the Kitchen Door.

 

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If You're a Millennial, Black, or Latino, Good Luck Voting Quickly in 2016

—By Dana Liebelson

| Tue Nov. 19, 2013 3:00 AM PST

 

Bunnicula/Flickr

When I voted last year in downtown Washington, DC, I was able to walk down the street, cast my ballot, and get back to the office in less than 30 minutes. But according to a new report by two voting rights groups, the Advancement Project and OurTime.org, plenty of American voters weren't so lucky. According to their research, African Americans, Latinos, and millennials in Virginia and Florida—two key battleground states—faced significantly longer wait times than older white voters in 2012. This was largely because the former groups are more inclined to utilize early voting, which was restricted in both states last year. And according to the report, this new "time tax"—along with other voting obstacles, like strict ID laws—will likely continue to dampen voter turnout among these groups in 2016.
In 2012, Florida cut early voting from 14 days to 8 days, and lines were so long, more than 200,000 Florida voters gave up and went home, according to data collected by the Orlando Sentinel. The Advancement Project and OurTime.org report focused on 5,196 of the 6,100 voting precincts that were used last November in Florida—which faced some of the longest voting lines in the country—and found that young voters spent a disproportionately longer time waiting to vote. For example, in Orange County, which has the highest percentage of voters younger than 30 in the state (22 percent), precincts closed an average of 86 minutes after the 7 p.m. deadline, with one precinct closing five hours late. The report found that in Orange County, the trend indicated that the more voters under 30 there were at a certain precinct, the later the closing time.
"Regarding the number of people willing to wait in line to vote in 2012, there were others who didn't vote, and there is no guarantee that voters will always be able to wait so long to exercise their fundamental rights," says Katherine Culliton-González, director of Advancement Project's Voter Protection Program. The report makes the case that young voters have less flexibility with their work schedules, and when early voting days are cut, as they were in Florida, lines get longer. Millennials (defined in the report as people between the ages of 18 and 29) are also more racially diverse than the rest of the population, meaning that there is often an overlap between young voters and voters of color. This 2013 MIT report found that voters of color are also more likely to wait in line than white voters:

The conservative Heritage Foundation maintains that African Americans face longer voting times than white voters because they "tend to be concentrated in large urban areas" and "the most populous areas had longer wait times than those living in areas with fewer voters." But Culliton-González, from the Advancement Project, tells Mother Jones that her group's study disproves this, since their research found that there wasn't a clear correlation between longer lines and precincts with dense populations. She says that, in Virginia, for example, "unless a voter can prove they are sick, otherwise disabled, or have to travel for work on Election Day, all voters must vote on the first Tuesday in November. These limits are probably what caused the disparities, as due to socioeconomic factors, many young voters of color have less flexibility in their work schedules." Voting rights groups argue that all states should offer flexible early voting—but some states have done the opposite: North Carolina, for example, is restricting early voting from 17 days to 10 days, starting in 2014.
Culliton-González adds, "We are concerned about 2014, but even more concerned about 2016," since Florida and other states will likely not have enough early voting time so that voters can avoid long lines. (The Advancement Project didn't find evidence of the "time tax" in the state elections earlier this month, partly because voter turnout was so low.)
But even if early voting is taken care of, young voters of color are also more likely to be turned away from the polls because of identification requirements. This was true in 2012, even in states that didn't have voter ID requirements on the books (see chart below). In the state elections that occurred earlier this month, numerous voters complained of being unable to vote because of real or perceived voter ID laws.

According to data collected by the Black Youth Project, an activist group that does research on issues that affect African American youth, only 67 percent of Latino youth and 71 percent of black youth possess driver's licenses, compared to 85 percent of white youth. Additionally, three times more young black voters than white voters said that lack of an ID was the reason they didn't vote in 2012. The Advancement Project and OurTime.org have submitted their report to the Presidential Committee on Election Administration, President Obama's group that is tasked with finding ways to improve voting.

Dana Liebelson

Reporter

Dana Liebelson is a reporter in Mother Jones' Washington bureau. Her work has also appeared in The Week, TIME's Battleland, Truthout, OtherWords and Yahoo! News. RSS | Twitter

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Good News issues statement on UM Council of Bishops request

November 15, 2013 By UMReporter Staff 

Good News, the independent group of United Methodists committed to promoting “orthodox Wesleyan Christianity,” has issued the following statement in response to the United Methodist Council of Bishops statement earlier today requesting the filing of a complaint against the actions of Bishop Melvin G. Talbert:

Good News, a renewal and reform ministry working within The United Methodist Church, applauds the statement issued today in response to the same-sex union service performed by Bishop Melvin Talbert October 26 in Birmingham, Alabama.  We view the statement as an implied rebuke of Bishop Talbert’s actions.
The fact that the Council requested that complaints be filed against Bishop Talbert for both “conducting ceremonies which celebrate homosexual unions” and “behavior that undermines the ministry of another pastor” is very significant.  It is virtually unprecedented for a bishop to file a complaint against another bishop.  (The Council as a whole is unable to file complaints, according to the Discipline.)  We hope that Bishop Wenner and Bishop Wallace-Padgett will follow through prayerfully and promptly with the Council’s request to file complaints and initiate the judicial process.
The church is watching to see if it can hold its leaders accountable to the promises they made to the church at their ordination and consecration.  All eyes will be on Bishop Elaine Stanovski (Mountain Sky Area), who is the president of the Western Jurisdiction College of Bishops, to ensure that any complaints are processed according to the Discipline.  The judicial process will take time, and there is no guarantee of the final outcome, but this is the process we have of holding persons accountable when they are accused of violating the sacred trust of their ordination.
While we wish the statement would have called for Bishop Talbert’s resignation, we are pleased that the Council united to hold him accountable by criticizing his actions and initiating judicial processes against him.  We affirm comments made by Bishop Rosemarie Wenner at a press conference following the meeting, where she said, “The bishops have to play a role in the [judicial] process … bishops have to follow through due to the charge we are given.”
We call upon other parts of the church to now fulfill their responsibilities of accountability.  We further call upon all United Methodists to stand down from schismatic actions and honor the process of holy conferencing.  Continued violation of ordination vows will only serve to deepen the division in Christ’s body and hasten a separation of the body that would harm the mission of the church.

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This Is The Best Anti-Walmart Protest Ever

This Is The Best Anti-Walmart Protest Ever (VIDEO)

Author: Elisabeth Parker September 9, 2013 9:41 am

 

When these Walmart workers tried to deliver a petition, the managers refused to take it. You’ll be amazed by what happens next.

September 5th was a great day for Walmart haters, as workers and their supporters rallied in 15 cities across the nation to demand that Walmart pay higher wages and reinstate the 70 Walmart workers who got fired for striking this summer. 20 of these workers are affiliated with the Walmart workers’ advocacy group, Organization United for Respect (OUR Walmart). Al Jazeera reminds us that Walmart is America’s largest employer, with 1.3 million workers.
According to Labor Notes:

They didn’t strike this time—but Walmart workers and their allies marched, rallied, danced, blew horns, and took arrests in a coordinated day of action in 15 cities yesterday. They were protesting the company’s recent crackdown on worker activists.

Any one who’s been following Reverend Dr. William Barber’s Moral Mondays knows when folks in Raleigh, NC protest, they’re not fooling around. And on Thursday, Raleigh’s Walmart workers did not disappoint. A somber group of workers walked into a Walmart and their leader sternly attempted to hand the managers a huge looseleaf binder holding a petition with 170,000 signatures demanding that Walmart rehire the workers fired during the strikes.
The managers predictably refused to accept the petition, and then something amazing happened, as reported by Labor Notes:

As the managers give their canned response (they can’t accept the binder, they’ll talk with “associates” but non-employees have to leave), shouts begin to echo through the store. A flash mob in yellow “UFCW [United Food and Commercial Workers] Local 1208 Steppin’ 4 Justice” bursts forth to perform an energetic synchronized routine.

Here’s the flash mob video:

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Wisconsin Republicans Roll Anti-Democratic Measures Through Assembly

Wisconsin Republicans Roll Anti-Democratic Measures Through Assembly

Posted by Brendan Fischer on November 15, 2013

 

Wisconsin Republicans rolled a raft of anti-democrat measures through the legislature late Thursday night, ranging from additional restrictions on voting to new limits on the right to recall elected officials, following a recall effort against Governor Scott Walker last year.

Recall the Recalls

A proposed constitutional amendment passed by the Assembly on Thursday would limit the recall power that has been part of the state constitution for eighty years.
Currently, the state Constitution allows for recall of state elected officials for any reason. The amendment would only allow for recall if a state officeholder is charged with a felony or ethics violation. Wisconsin is one of 18 states that allows for recalls; of those, only seven limit recall to elected officials guilty of misconduct in office.
The constitutional right was exercised in recent years to trigger a recall election for Scott Walker after the newly-elected governor pushed a series of radical measures through the legislature, including restrictions on public sector collective bargaining, cuts in education funding, and voting restrictions; many of the measures were never discussed on the campaign trail and took the state by surprise, prompting massive protests in the capitol. State Senators from both parties were also targeted for recall. Those recall efforts could never have proceeded had the limits passed Thursday been in place.
The broad, unlimited right of recall was added to the state constitution in 1926 during the Progressive Era as a mechanism of accountability. ‘Fighting Bob’ LaFollette campaign literature from the early 20th Century says: “By the recall, a faithless public official may be retired without waiting for the evil to be fully consummated. Under such a law, the public official will no longer betray his constituency."
Rep. Fred Kessler (D-Milwaukee) echoed those sentiments on Thursday. "What are the authors [of the recall amendment] afraid of?" he asked. "Why in the world are they trying to set aside the ability of voters ... to recall someone who they think made a mistake? ... It's a democratic right of people to be heard and it's something that should not be suppressed."
The proposed amendment passed along party lines but is not a done deal. A constitutional amendment must pass the full Legislature two sessions in a row, and then be approved in a statewide vote; the earliest that could happen in 2015.
The legislature also passed similar limits on recall for municipal and school officials, which need only pass the Senate and be signed by Governor Walker. Ironically, had those restrictions been in place in 2002, they would have quashed the recall effort that led to Walker's rise to power. In 2002, Walker aligned himself with an attempted recall against then-Milwaukee County Executive Tom Ament, who hadn't been convicted of a felony or ethics violation; after Ament resigned, Walker was elected County Executive.

Voter ID, Back Again?

The legislature also voted along party lines to alter the state's voter ID law in the face of legal challenges.
After Governor Scott Walker and a GOP-dominated legislature took power in 2011, Wisconsin was one of several states to pass a law requiring an ID to vote. The law threatened to disenfranchise more than 300,000 voters who did not have the required forms of ID, primarily people of color, students, and the elderly -- voters who had turned out in record numbers just a few years earlier to elect President Obama. Wisconsin's law was subsequently struck down by two separate state courts on grounds that its burdens were too severe and it imposed eligibility requirements beyond those provided by the Wisconsin Constitution. One decision was reversed on appeal, but the other is still in effect and the law remains blocked. The law is also currently being challenged in federal court under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
This latest bill is designed to overcome those legal challenges but would still make it harder to vote for low-income Wisconsinites.
Under the legislation, voters will still be asked to present an ID, and if they do not have one, they must sign an affidavit swearing not only that they do not have the forms of identification required under the law, but also declaring that they either are too poor to get an ID or cannot gather the necessary documentation.
"This bill says that poor people need to declare their indigency. It's a scarlet letter," said Rep. JoCasta Zamarripa (D-Milwaukee).
The bill passed the Assembly 54-38 along party lines and now goes to the Republican-dominated Senate. Its fate in the Senate is uncertain: Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau) has said that he would rather wait for courts to rule on the original voter ID legislation before making changes to the law.

Early Voting Limits, Chief Justice Selection Alterations

Another bill will limit early voting to weekdays between 7:30 a.m. and 6 p.m., effectively ending weekend voter drives in Democratic strongholds such as Milwaukee and Madison. In 2008, President Obama won Wisconsin by 14 points, thanks in part to an aggressive "vote early" campaign where one in five voters cast absentee ballots in-person at their County Clerk's office. After Republicans took control of the state legislature in 2010, they cut the number of days and weekends for early voting in half, from one month before the election to just two weeks. Still, in the 2012 elections at least 392,000 people voted early at their clerk's offices, and Obama again won the state by a sizable margin.
The measure passed Thursday will limit the practice even further, eliminating early voting on the weekends, and during the weekdays, imposing a 6pm cutoff. This would have a significant impact on working people. Last November in Milwaukee County and other larger counties, voters could cast a ballot until 7pm on weekdays, and between 9am and 5pm on weekends. The measure now goes to the Senate.
The legislature also voted along party lines to amend the state constitution to alter the selection process for the state Supreme Court's Chief Justice, changing it from a seniority system to one based on peer selection. The measure appears aimed at ousting Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson, an independent judge on a court that in recent years has become dominated by corporate-backed jurists, many of whom have been elected with support from the state chapter of the Chamber of Commerce and shadowy out-of-state groups. Spending on Wisconsin's judicial elections have skyrocketed in recent years, shifting the court to the right and helping its reputation to plummet.
Like the recall measure, the amendment must pass two sessions of the legislature and be approved by voters.
Among other things, the Assembly also voted along party lines to approve new specialty license plates that read "In God We Trust" and "Choose Life," and to limit public access to a proposed iron ore mine site in Northern Wisconsin.

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The Gospel of Selfishness in American Christianity

The Gospel of Selfishness in American Christianity

How the philosophers of selfishness came to use Christianity as their cover story.

AlterNet / By Amanda Marcotte

November 14, 2013  |  

  Anyone who has worked in the restaurant business will be happy to tell you that waiters always fight each other to avoid working Sunday lunch shift. Not because they want to sleep in, but because it’s a widespread belief that the post-church crowd is loud, demanding and unwilling to tip appropriately. In the food service industry, “Christian” is synonymous with “selfish.”
Unfair stereotype? Probably. Big groups, regardless of affiliation, tend to tip poorly. More to the point, waiters probably remember the bad Christian tippers more because the hypocrisy is so stunning. The image of a man piously preening about what a good Christian he is in church only to turn around and refuse the basic act of decency that is paying someone what you owe them perfectly symbolizes a lurking suspicion in American culture that the harder someone thumps the Bible, the more selfish and downright sadistic a person he is. And that perception—that showy piety generally goes hand in hand with very un-Christ-like behavior—is not an urban myth at all. On the contrary, it’s the daily reality of American culture and politics.
Bill Maher recently had a rant on his show that went viral addressing this very issue, bad tippers who leave sermons or notes scolding waiters instead of paying them what they’re owed. His larger point is a much more important one: It’s absolutely disgusting how the politicians who make the biggest show of how much they love Jesus would be the first in line to bash him if he returned with a message of clothing the naked and feeding the poor. The Jesus of the Bible multiplied the loaves and fishes. His loudest followers these day gripe about feeding people, claiming it creates a “culture of dependency.” They may even comb through the Bible to take quotes out of context to justify their selfishness toward the poor, as Rep. Steven Fincher did when he claimed the Bible says, “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.” The fact that those jobs are unavailable didn’t give him a moment’s pause when suggesting this very un-Christ-like plan to his fellow Americans.
There are plenty of progressive Christians who genuinely try to live out Jesus’ command to love your neighbor as yourself, described in the Bible as the root of Jesus’ entire philosophy. That said, statistics bear out the sense that people who are more invested in being perceived as pious also embrace the most selfish policies. Self-identified conservatives and Republicans claim go to church regularly at twice the rate of self-identified liberals. People who go to church more than once a week are far more conservative than the rest of the population. Indeed, the research suggests how often you report being in the pews is the most reliable indicator of how you’re going to vote. (Though it may not be a reliable indicator of how often you actually go to church. In the grand tradition of showy piety, people who claim to be avid church-goers often lie about it to pollsters.)
The attempts to reconcile the correlation between displays of piety and support for selfish policies get complex on the right, with conservatives often arguing that hating your neighbor at the voting booth doesn’t count because church charities supposedly make up for it. (They don’t.) In reality, the relationship between Christian piety and support for selfish policies is fairly straightforward. It’s not that being Christian makes you conservative. It’s that being conservative makes being a loud and pious Christian extremely attractive.

Without Christianity, the underlying mean-spiritedness of conservative policies is simply easier to spot. Without religion, you’re stuck making libertarian-style arguments that sound like things cackling movie villains would say, like Ayn Rand saying civilization should reject “the morality of altruism.” Since Christianity teaches altruism and generosity, it provides excellent cover for people who want to be selfish, a sheep’s clothing made of Jesus to cover up the child-starving wolf beneath. Since Christians are “supposed” to be good people, people who really aren’t good are lining up to borrow that reputation to advance their agenda.

The fact that conservatism causes obnoxious Christian piety in American culture is most obvious when looking at some of the theological developments that have accrued since the philosophers of selfishness decided to use Christianity as their cover story. The “prosperity gospel” that has developed in recent years is a classic example.
The prosperity gospel teaches, to be blunt, that you can tell how much God favors you by how rich you are. While some on the Christian right reject this idea as a tad crude, it’s still wildly popular and its adherents, like Oral Roberts, are some of the major architects and organizers for the Christian right. It’s a perfect example of how conservative ideology leads to pious Christianity. People want to believe that the rich are better than everyone else and the poor don’t deserve squat, so they find a way to blame God for it rather than own their own greed and selfishness.
Pope Francis may be entirely sincere when he says he wants Catholic clergy to deemphasize the right-wing political pandering in favor of highlighting values that are more in line with liberalism, such as compassion and generosity to the poor, but the odds are slim of this message making inroads with church leaders in the United States. The church needs conservatives who need to believe they’re good and holy people despite their selfish beliefs. Without them, who will show up and tithe? Liberals? Most of them are sleeping in on Sundays, secure that their commitment to social justice makes them good people regardless of how visibly pious they are.
The fact of the matter is that the purposes religion serves in America are shrinking in number. Our cultural identity is increasingly shaped by pop culture, not faith or ethnic identity. Our holidays are more about shopping and having a chance to catch up with far-flung family these days, not showing devotion to a deity. Spiritual needs are often addressed through modern means like psychotherapy and self-help. People build communities through hobbies and interests more than through faith communities bound by geography, ethnicity and family.
Increasingly, the only thing religion has left to justify itself is that it provides cover for people who want to have bigoted, selfish beliefs but want to believe they are good people anyway. As these social trends continue, we can expect the alignment between public piety and grotesquely selfish political beliefs to get worse, not better.

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Four American Myths You Probably Believe

 Four American Myths You Probably Believe

 posted on  November 12, 2013 8:30 pm by John Henry

 

 

Ah, America.  The shining city on the hill; the world’s only remaining superpower; bastion of freedom, integrity, and sacrifice for the greater good; egalitarianism writ large and stuffing the power of the people in the face of oppressive monarchies the world over.
Except we’re really not.  Today we’re going to take a look at some of our most cherished myths…and let’s not pull any punches, folks:  myths are exactly what they are.  As in, stories people made up with little to no basis in reality.

4.  The Founding Fathers Were Champions Of The Average Citizen

Patently untrue, and the very structure of our government is evidence of it.  James Madison lays out an excellent, and eloquent, rationale for this in Federalist Papers (#10).  Among many other things, Madison writes:

“To secure the public good and private rights against the danger of such a faction, and at the same time to preserve the spirit and the form of popular government, is then the great object to which our inquiries are directed…By what means is this object attainable? Evidently by one of two only. Either the existence of the same passion or interest in a majority at the same time must be prevented, or the majority, having such coexistent passion or interest, must be rendered, by their number and local situation, unable to concert and carry into effect schemes of oppression.”

Madison, however, wasn’t by far the only small-r republican founding father.  Jefferson wrote, “A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.” Oh, whoops, no he didn’t – that’s a popular but fake quote that never saw the light of day prior to 2004 as far as the best researchers can find.  He did however say “All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.”  In asserting the principle of equality under law for minority rights, Jefferson presupposes that at least occasionally the perspective and interests of the minority must be ethically, morally, or technically superior to those of the majority.
The entire reason we have a bicameral legislature is explicitly to avoid “majority rule,” in this case the rule of larger and more populous states over their smaller and less populous confederates.  This is why the House of Representatives apportions representation by population…but in the Senate, every state is allowed two and only two representatives.  (It’s also why under the US Constitution, as originally written, Senators were not directly elected but rather appointed by state legislatures.)
The idea here was not to form a writhing, confused mass of “common men” to whom would be entrusted the definition of regulations; rather, to allow for that “common” voice to be heard and tempered by the more sober and less reactionary analysis and debate by the Senate.
The bottom line:  The US constitution was written, by and large, not from a basis of overwhelming admiration for the majority but rather from a principled commitment to equality under law.  The founders recognized that human beings – themselves included – are fallible and prone to self-service when given the opportunity to engage in it; the entire structure of our government is an attempt to govern with respect for individual rights but not with carte blanche license for any sufficiently large group of people to oppress others.  That this fear was valid is self-evident; while thousands of examples could be cited, one need only look as far as various state constitutional amendments banning gay marriage to validate concerns about the potential abuse of power inherent in pure majority rule.

3.  Abraham Lincoln Was A Champion of Racial Equality and Black People

This may be the biggest myth of them all, and ties in with a secondary myth.  The founding fathers and many of our most prominent historical figures, were in fact blatant racists who held ideas about ethnicity that would have them laughed or mobbed off the national stage today.  Again, there is an overabundance of evidence for this.  For instance, in his fourth debate against Stephen Douglas, he said:

I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. (source)

This hardly strikes one as a resounding assertion of equality, but it doesn’t stop there.  Indeed, this isn’t even the most objectionable passage from this speech.  At the same event – in nearly the same breath – Lincoln also said things like:

• “I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”
• “I have never had the least apprehension that I or my friends would marry negroes if there was no law to keep them from it, [laughter] but as Judge Douglas and his friends seem to be in great apprehension that they might, if there were no law to keep them from it, [roars of laughter] I give him the most solemn pledge that I will to the very last stand by the law of this State, which forbids the marrying of white people with negroes.”

This was neither the first nor last time Lincoln would say things that today would have people up in arms opposing him – for entirely different reasons than those who eventually did take up arms opposing him.  In the first Douglas debate, Lincoln floated an idea that was quite popular among American whites – and even some blacks – of the era:  ship all the slaves back to Africa.  “My first impulse would be to free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia,-to their own native land.”  Not only that, but he wasn’t the strident abolitionist that “history” has made him out to be.  In the same speech, contemplating solutions to slavery, he said “I think I would not hold one in slavery at any rate; yet the point is not clear enough to me to denounce people upon. What next? Free them, and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this; and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not.” (emphasis added).
Lincoln had a very serious objection to slavery in principle, but to suggest that principle was in any way rooted in an enlightened attempt to forge a post-racial society is ludicrous and entirely contrary to the historical record.
And Lincoln was far from the only one on the antebellum bigot train.  Many if not most of the founding fathers owned slaves; the involvement – if fathering a half-dozen children can be accurately described by such a tepid euphemism – of Thomas Jefferson with his slave Sally Hemings has been well-recounted and there’s no need to repeat it here…but some of Jefferson’s own words may prove enlightening. “Comparing [blacks to whites] by their faculties of memory, reason, and imagination, it appears to me, that in memory they are equal to the whites; in reason much inferior, as I think one could scarcely be found capable of tracing and comprehending the investigations of Euclid; and that in imagination they are dull, tasteless, and anomalous.” (source)
Of course it’s not entirely fair to hold men of past centuries and eras to modern standards; much has been accomplished by science – without taking into account philosophy – to dissolve the once-common myths about racial disparities.  (Among these, one mentioned by Jefferson that non-human primates held a strong sexual attraction for black women!  “…their own judgment in favour of the whites, declared by their preference of them, as uniformly as is the preference of the Oranootan (i.e. orangutan -jh) for the black women over those of his own species…” (ibid.))
Make no mistake; while there are plenty of excellent reasons to admire and respect these men, there is also not a chance in the world that their opinions in matters of race would last more than five minutes in the modern world.  Just imagine if a presidential candidate in 2013 came out claiming that orange apes love to schtupp black women – and let’s not forget the inference here that such amorous advances must have been assumed to be a regular and expected occurrence among African blacks, according to the conventional wisdom of the time; i.e. the inference that in at least some instances black women willfully allowed such bestiality to take place.
See how far you’d get running for public office on that platform!
(As a sidebar, one of the currently popular criticisms of Lincoln was that he “illegally/unconstitutionally suspended habeas corpus.”  Bullshit; he was precisely within constitutional limits.  The relevant section reads in full:  “The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.” (source, Section 9)  I can hardly think of a more patently clear “Case of Rebellion” than in the collective attempt of several states to detach from the union.)

2.  All Our Heroes Were Heroic

Sure, sometimes.  But oftentimes, not so much.  President Ulysses S. Grant was a drunk driver who once was ticketed, and his carriage impounded, by the DC police (actually Maryland at the time); and who also once ran over a young boy’s foot (it’s not known if he was under the influence during this incident).
Thomas Edison was a relentless patent troll who once attempted to place the entire film industry under his control…and in so doing, inadvertently created Hollywood.  His overt screwing of Nikola Tesla, while somewhat overstated by the internet’s love affair with the latter, is still pretty legendary.
Einstein rejected both the “Big Bang” theory and the then-theoretical existence of black holes.
Washington owned slaves, and experienced several military situations in which only sheer luck saved him from defeat.
Longtime epitome of masculinity, Rock Hudson was a lifelong homosexual – not that this is a problem for me or any thinking person, but it certainly would have been one with his fanbase if they’d found out about it in the 50’s rather than after he died of AIDS in the 80’s, and more to the point of this entry it goes entirely against everything we thought we knew about the guy.
John Wayne – who excellently deconstructed his own mythos, with the help of similarly self-immolating director John Ford, in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence among other late-career films, was the swaggering embodiment of American Machismo…yet he never served in the US military.
Ironically, Jimmy Stewart – who plays the pacifist/reluctant gunslinger who ultimately fashions a political career out of taking credit for shooting a man actually shot by Wayne in Valence, and whose film career is studded with characters who are basically the diametric opposite of the Wayne archetype – did serve, as an ace pilot in WWII, presiding over at least one court-martial, and ultimately serving his last notable duty as an observer – as Brigadier General of the Air Force Reserve – of a bombing run…in 1966, over Vietnam.)
Henry Ford revolutionized mass production…and was a raging anti-Semite who published a 91-part series in his own paper (the Dearborn Independent) and a copy of the execrable and entirely fake Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and who was cited as both a major influence on, and a serious admirer of, Adolf Hitler.
Charles Lindberg was a staunch isolationist and outspoken admirer of the Nazi regime, even being awarded high military honors by the Hitler government.  Ford and Lindbergh are only two of scores of well-respected and well-known Americans who broadly supported Nazism or, at the very least, strongly discouraged the US from entering World War II…an effort so effective that ultimately it required both Pearl Harbor and the preemptive declaration of war against the US by Germany in its aftermath – to rally the “freest nation on earth” to the defense of an entire population being snuffed out by hate.
Although we like to pretend our heroes are above reproach, the reality is they’re just as human, and just as fallible, as anyone else.

1.  The United States is “The Freest Nation On Earth.”

Utter nonsense.  Setting aside entirely the question of how our relentless pursuit of material wealth relegates the vast majority of us to, at best, just-barely-above-poverty lifestyles, the stark truth of the matter is that the US imprisons a greater percentage of its population than any other nation on earth, including those to whom we routinely point as the most oppressive and least free.   In fact, the US – in spite of having less than five percent of the world’s population, holds nearly a quarter of all imprisoned people in the world at 2.3 million – by way of contrast, China with about four times the population of the US, has 600,000 fewer prisoners.
At a time in human history when nearly every developed nation has embraced socialized institutions including education, law enforcement, and health care, the US has roundly rejected all three and continues to move at breakneck speed into irreversible plutocracy.  While ordinary citizens are told in no uncertain terms that they are not worthy to criticize elected officials, uber-wealthy industrialists such as the Koch Brothers, Jamie Dimon, and others continue to both author and lobby for legislation at the state and federal level and even gain appointments to the supposedly liberal, populist Obama administration.
If “freedom” is measured by the number of ice cream flavors or hamburger styles one might choose from, then perhaps we’re a contender for “freest nation on earth.”  By any other measure, however, we’re a long way from actually realizing that persistent myth.
While the rise of the citizen journalist in the post-Internet age has provided some measure of resistance to oligarchy, in reality we are far from practically achieving the reality that our mythological self-image suggests.  Getting informed – properly informed by reliable and trustworthy sources – is the only real weapon we the people have against the ongoing conversion of the United States from a democratic republic to a plutocratic fiefdom.

John Henry

John Henry is a social, media, and political analyst currently attaining a Bachelor of Arts in Communication (Media Production) at Western Michigan University. You can find more of his work at his site, lowgenius.net, or click here for his youtube channel.
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On Racism, Cultural Racism & Systemic Racism ~ The KaDoh! Institute

November 12, 2013The Kadoh! Institute, Fact Kheck Krew, The Body PolitiK KrewRacism, Cultural Racism, Ku Klux Klan, Washington Post, Richard Cohen, Harry Belafonte, Governor Christie, New Jersey, David DukeThe Kadoh! Institute

Richard Cohen, Columnist for the Washington Post has penned the attached Opinion Column in the Washington Post.
In his column, Mr. Cohen carefully explains that,

Today’s GOP is not racist, as Harry Belafonte alleged about the tea party, but it is deeply troubled — about the expansion of government, about immigration, about secularism, about the mainstreaming of what used to be the avant-garde. People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children. (Should I mention that Bill de Blasio’s wife, Chirlane McCray, used to be a lesbian?) This family represents the cultural changes that have enveloped parts — but not all — of America. To cultural conservatives, this doesn’t look like their country at all.
As with the Dixiecrats, the fight is not over a particular program — although Obamacare comes close — but about a tectonic shift of attitudes. I thank Dennis J. Goldford, professor of politics and international relations at Drake University in Des Moines, for leading me to a live performance on YouTube of Merle Haggard singing “Are the Good Times Really Over.” This chestnut, a lament for a lost America, has been viewed well more than 2 million times. It could be the tea party’s anthem.
For all his positions and religious beliefs, Christie is too Joisey for the tea party — too brash, as well. He would be wise to steer clear of Iowa lest he lose or, worse, follow Romney and take on the deeply conservative coloration of the state’s GOP. That might make him (barely) acceptable to Republican Iowans but anathema to the rest of us.”

So I took the time to register (thanks for making it easy Washington Post & Facebook!) and comment.
I linked in an article from the American Psychological Association which explains that Cultural Racism is indeed a “thing.”

For the record, I like Governor Christie.  I think he will be a nominee for the President.  I think he could make a race of the next election.  I do not like the party to which he belongs.
From the historical record, it’s quite possible the country will shift a bit rightward, as we typically don’t elect the same party to the Presidency 3 times in a row.
That has happened once in my lifetime, and President Bush then lost to then nominee, President Clinton.
The problem as I see it is that the calculus is changing.  When you have prominent columnists who are so blase about Cultural racism, it’s astounding.
When the prominent politicians kow-tow to Cultural Racists it’s worse than disheartening.  It’s threatening.
Out here in California we see you racists for what you are.  And that’s racists.  And I cannot vote in good conscious for a racist.   Period.
Sorry that you feel the “country isn’t your country anymore” or whatever alienation you feel.  Perhaps you missed out on some standard Americana in your upbringing.
This poem explains my upbringing here in California.

The California Kid
Hello, there
Nice to meet you
I am California Kid,
Standard issue
Raised to respect my elders
Take care of the disabled
Help the poor
Do unto others as you’d have done unto you
Live and let live
Respect the Constitution
Honor veterans in our midst
Celebrate mom, baseball & apple pie
Pay taxes as due (grumbling under breath)
Work hard, play hard
Oh yes, don’t be racist, or discriminate
Combine that all and you have me
Moderate of practicality
Mixed with synergy
Standard Issue
Here in Great Central Valley

Try not to be racist, that might help.
I would hope that Mr. Cohen would consider the cultural racism in the GOP, and revise his opinion.     But I do not know if he is an impartial journalist at heart, or a Conservative.
I do believe that the Cultural Racism is part and partial of Mr. Cohen due to his own words in the article.  Including the ending sentence as to why Governor Christie is unacceptable, even anethema to him.

That might make him (barely) acceptable to Republican Iowans but anathema to the rest of us.

Once again Mr. Cohen.  Cultural racism exists, and you in your own words embrace it, finding a candidate who doesn’t hold such values as “anathema.”
I will defend Mr.  Cohen’s right to express his racism verbally.  I will defend the rest of our right to counter his offensive language with our own free speech, and document the indemic racism in his “Opinion Column.”
And regulate as necessary to keep people free from physical harm from such racists.  You know, the KKK, Aryan Brotherhood and the like.
Afterall the GoP is the party that allowed David Duke (Grand Wizard of the KKK),  to run for Congress in their party, and Lousiana is the state that elected him to the House.
I do believe that racism is systemic in the GOP.  Sorry if you believe that is not true.
Good day.

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Everything That’s Happened Since Supreme Court Ruled on Voting Rights Act 

by Kara Brandeisky and Mike Tigas
ProPublica, Nov. 1, 2013, 11:24 a.m.

Last year, we wrote extensively about photo ID laws and the Supreme Court’s decision to strike a key section of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Now, with gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia, and the debt ceiling and healthcare debates already shaping the 2014 midterms, we’re revisiting voting policies to see which states have enacted tougher restrictions since the Supreme Court ruling in June.
Remind me – what is Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act?

Under the Voting Rights Act, states and localities with a history of racial discrimination needed to get permission from the federal government to enact any changes to their voting laws, in a process called “preclearance.” As of June 2013, nine states, mostly in the South – Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia – needed to get any new voting laws pre-approved. Some counties and townships in California, Florida, New York, North Carolina, South Dakota and Michigan were also subject to preclearance.
Section 5 first applied to states that imposed literacy tests or other unfair devices, and had low voter registration or turnout. Congress later expanded the law to add jurisdictions with sizable minority populations and English-only election materials.
States and localities could “bailout,” or get off the preclearance list, after 10 years of elections without any problems. Several smaller jurisdictions bailed out over the years, including parts of Connecticut, Idaho, Maine, Massachusetts, Wyoming, Hawaii, and Colorado.
Of course, some of the biggest voting law battles of the 2012 election were in states not covered by Section 5 at all, such as Pennsylvania and Ohio.
What did the Supreme Court strike down in Shelby County v. Holder?
The Supreme Court decided, 5-4, that the preclearance formula was unconstitutional under the 10^th  Amendment, which gives states the power to regulate elections. The Court ruled that the coverage formula was “based on 40-year-old facts having no logical relation to the present day.”
From the decision:

Cite as: 570 U. S. ____ (2013)

3

Syllabus
cial discrimination in voting" that had "infected the electoral process
in parts of our country for nearly a century," Katzenbach, 383 U. S.,
at 308. At the time, the coverage formula--the means of linking the
exercise of the unprecedented authority with the problem that warranted 

it--made sense. The Act was limited to areas where Congress
found "evidence of actual voting discrimination," and the covered 

jurisdictions shared two characteristics: "the use of tests and devices
for voter registration, and a voting rate in the 1964 presidential 

election at least 12 points below the national average." Id., at 330. The
Court explained that "[t]ests and devices are relevant to voting 

discrimination because of their long history as a tool for perpetrating
the evil; a low voting rate is pertinent for the obvious reason that
widespread disenfranchisement must inevitably affect the number of
actual voters." Ibid. The Court therefore concluded that "the coverage 

formula [was] rational in both practice and theory." Ibid.
Pp. 12-13.
(3) Nearly 50 years later, things have changed dramatically.
Largely because of the Voting Rights Act, "[v]oter turnout and 

registration rates" in covered jurisdictions "now approach parity. 

Blatantly discriminatory evasions of federal decrees are rare. And minority
candidates hold office at unprecedented levels." Northwest Austin,
supra, at 202. The tests and devices that blocked ballot access have
been forbidden nationwide for over 40 years. Yet the Act has not
eased ?5's restrictions or narrowed the scope of ?4's coverage formula
along the way. Instead those extraordinary and unprecedented features have 

been reauthorized as if nothing has changed, and they
have grown even stronger. Because ?5 applies only to those jurisdictions 

singled out by ?4, the Court turns to consider that provision.
Pp. 13-17.
(b) Section 4's formula is unconstitutional in light of current conditions. 

Pp. 17-25.
(1) In 1966, the coverage formula was "rational in both practice
and theory." Katzenbach, supra, at 330. It looked to cause 

(discriminatory tests) and effect (low voter registration and turnout), 

and tailored the remedy (preclearance) to those jurisdictions exhibiting both.
By 2009, however, the "coverage formula raise[d] serious constitutional questions." 

Northwest Austin, supra, at 204. Coverage today
is based on decades-old data and eradicated practices. The formula
captures States by reference to literacy tests and low voter registration and 

turnout in the 1960s and early 1970s. But such tests have
been banned for over 40 years. And voter registration and turnout
numbers in covered States have risen dramatically. In 1965, the
States could be divided into those with a recent history of voting tests
and low voter registration and turnout and those without those char-

 

One important technical point: the Supreme Court actually left Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act – the part of the law that describes how preclearance works – intact. Instead, the Court struck down Section 4, which explains which states and localities are subject to preclearance. If Congress amends Section 4, the Justice Department can start enforcing Section 5 again.
Why does this matter?

Takeaways

• Seven preclearance states have announced new restrictions since the Supreme Court rolled back the Voting Rights Act.
• Last year, a federal court called Texas's photo ID law "most stringent in the country.” Now, it's in effect.
• Two months after the Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Act, North Carolinacut early voting and eliminated same-day registration.
• Are you registered to vote? Virginia has purged 38,000 voters, and Kansas has suspended registration for 17,500.

While literacy tests are a thing of the past, voting rights advocates say that statutes that limit early voting and registration, require voters to show photo ID, and purge voter rolls still disproportionately affect poor and minority voters.
The Supreme Court’s June 2013 decision also effectively shifted the burden from states to citizens. Before, a state subject to preclearance had to demonstrate that a new voting law was not discriminatory and let voting law experts in the Justice Department evaluate it before it could be implemented. Now it is up to voters to challenge voting laws by filing lawsuits under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination.

But most court cases involving Section 2 have been limited to redistricting, not other controversial voting measures, says Yale University law professor Heather Gerken.
“With redistricting, there’s always one very wealthy political party or another who can hire some very good lawyers and go into court and challenge it,” Gerken said. “But a lot of the types of things that were challenged under Section 5 were smaller questions, like, ‘Can you change a polling place? Can you shut down early voting hours in ways that might affect the black community?’ There are things smaller than redistricting that can fall through the cracks.”
What have preclearance states done since the Supreme Court ruling?
a NORTH CAROLINA: Two months after the Supreme Court decision, North Carolina passed a number of measures, including strict new photo ID requirements. The law also eliminates same-day voter registration, shortens the early voting period by seven days, and specifies that ballots cast at the wrong polling station will be thrown out. Some changes will be phased in starting in 2014, and the photo ID provision goes into effect in 2016.
The North Carolina NAACP and a civil rights group called the Advancement Project have filed a lawsuit challenging the changes. The Justice Department also filed a suit of its own. But the suits venture into some new legal territory.
“What North Carolina did was definitely at the extreme of practices in this country,” Gerken said. “So if anything is vulnerable to a suit, it’s likely to be the North Carolina law. But again, the case law was built around redistricting cases. It wasn’t built around this kind of work.”
q TEXAS: Last year, a federal court rejected Texas’ voter ID law, calling it “the most stringent in the country.” The panel also rejected the state’s redistricting maps, finding that they protected white incumbents while altering districts with minority incumbents.
But on the very day of the Supreme Court ruling, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said the state would “immediately” enact both measures.
The photo ID law requires voters to present an approved form of photo identification, where before they could present mail, utility bills or other proof of voter registration. The Justice Department had refused to approve the law based on the state’s findings that Hispanic registered voters were far less likely to have the approved photo IDs. The new law also requires the photo ID presented on voting day to match the state’s voter rolls — complicating voting for some married women and others with name changes.
The Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against the newly enacted photo ID requirements and joined an ongoing lawsuit against the disputed redistricting maps.
I FLORIDA: After the Supreme Court ruling, Florida resumed its plans to remove non-citizens from its voter rolls using the federal SAVE (Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements) database. The Department of Homeland Security database helps government agencies check the immigration statuses of people applying for government benefits like drivers’ licenses, housing assistance, or Medicaid.
But opponents of Florida’s measure say that SAVE data is faulty and not meant for elections, and that using the database to verify voter rolls will disenfranchise eligible voters. (Colorado legislators rejected a bill to purge rolls based on SAVE data for this very reason, but that didn’t stop Secretary of State Scott Gessler from moving ahead with the plan.) The Miami Herald found that Florida voters flagged for verification were disproportionately Hispanic, and most turned out to be citizens. The Department of Justice has also said that SAVE is not meant to be “a comprehensive and definitive listing of U.S. citizens,” especially since it doesn’t include data about people born in the United States.
A nonprofit group has challenged the law, but a federal court dismissed the lawsuit after the Supreme Court ruled that Florida was no longer subject to preclearance. Another group has appealed a similar case to the 11^th Circuit.
s VIRGINIA: Virginia passed a number of voting laws this spring that seem likely to go into effect in wake of the Supreme Court ruling.
The Virginia legislature passed a photo ID law last year (which the Justice Department approved), but the more recent measure goes further to limit what kinds of voter identification are acceptable. Voters can no longer show utility bills, bank statements, government checks or paychecks before they vote, but they can get an ID for freeif they don’t already have one.
The new laws also require the Virginia State Board of Elections to remove ineligible voters by comparing state voter rolls with the SAVE database and other states.The Democratic Party of Virginia has sued the state over the interstate crosschecks, contending that the database has erroneous information and the law will disenfranchise poor, elderly and minority voters, but a federal judge rejected the suit for lack of evidence. As of Oct. 17, the Board of Elections had already purged more than 38,000 voters.
n SOUTH CAROLINA: In October 2012, a federal court blocked the implementation of South Carolina’s photo ID law until 2013. The court found that although the law was not discriminatory, there was not enough time to implement changes before the 2012 election. South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson said the Supreme Court ruling now allows states to “implement reasonable election reforms, such as voter ID laws similar to South Carolina’s.”
Y MISSISSIPI: Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann said Mississippi will enact a strict photo ID law by 2014. The state says it will provide free transportation to government offices where voters will be able to obtain free photo IDs.
B ALABAMA: Secretary of State Beth Chapman said Alabama would also enact changes to its photo ID law by 2014. Like Virginia, Alabama used to accept other kinds of non-photo identification, such as utility bills and Social Security cards. But the new law requires voters to present photo IDs (the state will also provide free voter IDs to those who don’t have them). Legislators passed the measure in 2011, but Alabama stalled in submitting the law for preclearance.
D ARIZONA: The Supreme Court issued another significant ruling on voting laws this summer: In Arizona et al. v Intertribal Council of Arizona, Inc. et al., the Court ruled that Arizona, formerly a preclearance state, could not unilaterally require voters to show proof of citizenship before registering to vote in a federal election. But the Court said Arizona could sue the Election Assistance Commission to get the federal voter registration form amended to require proof of citizenship. Now, both Arizona and Kansas have sued the commission.
In case their legal challenges are unsuccessful, the states are setting up two-tiered systems of voter registration, requiring proof of citizenship for state and local races but not federal ones. So far, Kansas has suspended registration for about 17,500 voters until those they submit proof of citizenship.
o SOUTH DAKOTA: Four Directions Inc., a Native American voting rights group, has asked the Justice Department to investigate why Secretary of State Jason Grant has so far refused to use federal money to fund satellite voting centers for registration and early voting on some Native American reservations.
What about non-preclearance states?
The 35 states that were not subject to any kind of preclearance were unaffected by the Supreme Court decision. But several of those states have also moved to tighten voting rules this year.
C ARKANSAS: This spring, Republican legislators overrode the governor’s veto to pass a law requiring voters to show photo IDs. If voters don’t have them, they can cast provisional ballots and return with IDs by the Monday after the election. The state will also provide free IDs to people who do not already have them.
L IOWA: In late March, Iowa implemented an administrative rule allowing Secretary of State Matt Schultz to begin a voter roll purge using the SAVE database. Activists have sued Schultz in an attempt to stop the purge.
O INDIANA: In May, Indiana enacted a law requiring officials to check voter rolls for individuals registered to vote in other states. The advocacy group Project Vote worries that the measure could lead to voter purges.
Z MONTANA: After Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock vetoed a measure that would have eliminated same-day voter registration, the legislature decided to let the people decide. In 2014, Montana citizens will vote in a referendum on whether to keep same-day registration. Backers of the measure say it will cut down on lines at the polls.
c NEBRASKA: This spring, Nebraska shortened early voting by 10 days. Voters will still be able to vote in the 25 days leading up to an election.
b NORTH DAKOTA: North Dakota is the only state without voter registration. In April, the state strengthened its voter ID law to no longer allow people without photo ID to vote by affidavit.
p TENNESSEE: This spring, Tennessee passed a bill restricting the kinds of IDs that can be used to vote. Previously, voters could show student IDs, out-of-state IDs, library cards, or any other IDs issued by counties or municipalities. Now only photo IDs issued by the state of Tennessee or the federal government are acceptable. The Green Party of Tennessee has sued the state over the law.
So, where does all of this leave the Voting Rights Act?
The Supreme Court left it up to Congress to write new preclearance criteria. In a July hearing, House Republicans showed little interest in rewriting Section 4. But Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., says there’s actually quiet Republican support for the issue. Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., made headlines when he publicly supported restoring the law.
“There is at least one Republican, and you’ll find out in the future a lot more, that is committing to putting life in this most important civil rights act that got a stab in the back from the Supreme Court,” Sensenbrenner said.
Gerken, the law professor, isn’t optimistic that Congress will come up with a new Section 4 formula. But she said there are other actions Congress could take. For example, she has advocated that Congress adopt an “opt-in” approach and allow civil rights groups to file simple complaints for the Justice Department to investigate. Then the agency could halt the implementation of discriminatory laws as necessary.
Yale law professor Travis Crum has also suggested a “bail-in” measure, by which Congress could instead strengthen Section 3 of the Voting Rights Act, letting courts put states under preclearance if their voting laws violate the 14^th or 15^th amendments.
As part of the Justice Department’s lawsuits against Texas and North Carolina, the federal agency has asked the courts to put those states back under preclearance.
This post will be kept up-to-date. Has your state or local government restricted voting rights since June 2013? Tweet at me, email me at kara.brandeisky@propublica.org or leave a comment below.

MAP METHODOLOGY: This map tracks state voting laws before and after Shelby County v. Holder on four key issues: photo ID, early voting, same-day registration and voter roll purging. States with the most restrictive voting measures involving these four issues are the darkest; each state earned one point per restrictive policy. So a state with restrictive policies in all four areas would have a score of four and appear the darkest. The “before” map reflects policies in place on June 24, 2013, the day before the Shelby County v. Holder ruling. The “after” map reflects policies in place as of Oct. 31, 2013, even if the changes are pending implementation. Details on scoring per issue follow.

Photo ID: States received a point if they will require photo ID in upcoming elections (even 2014 or 2016) as of Oct. 31, 2013. States that require ID but also accept non-photo IDs, such as paychecks or utility bills, didn’t receive a point. Likewise, states that have passed photo ID legislation but have been unable to enact the law because of a court order (such as Wisconsin and Pennsylvania), didn’t get a point.
Early voting: States received a point if they don’t allow in-person voting before Election Day, or require an excuse for absentee early voting. States that have shortened early voting didn’t get a point as long as they still allow some early voting.
Same-day registration: States received a point if they don’t allow registration on Election Day.
Voter roll purging: States received a point if they have asked for access to, or support using, the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE)database to maintain state voter rolls. Not all states that have requested access have actively begun purging voter rolls.

 

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