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Showing posts with label Texas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Texas. Show all posts

Friday, March 27, 2020

Republican Governors Playing Partisan Politics with Peoples Lives #COVID19

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Governors in the red, republican, Confederate, slave states are showing they care more about appeasing Trump than they care about the people they were elected to represent, their states and their country by not ordering people to stay home.



People will die because of them

Someone's parents, grandparents, brothers or sisters will die

Sadly, people in those states are in for a very scary awakening.

The question facing us all now as citizens is whether or not the response of our country to a worldwide pandemic is being driven by the basic strategy of the Piranha Brothers. That is, whether or not the president* is withholding vital medical aid during a national health crisis for the purpose of muzzling criticism of his obvious incompetence, and for the auxiliary purpose of gaining political advantage in November’s election. If the answer to either of those questions is “yes,” then we have an unreconstructed monster running the country and there’s no telling what he might do next.



Now that America has an incompetent, dimwitted dictator as the head of the household, the Republican policy of plausible deniability has been ruined. The dunderheaded daddy of the GOP has exposed his party’s ultimate goal—maintaining their status as the sole beneficiaries of America’s corporate, economic and political profiteering


Redeye tiptoeing away from the computer to go pray.
It looks like Nathaniel Woods isn’t the only person Gov. Kay Ivey is willing to put to death.

Monday, May 30, 2016

#BlackLivesMatter on #MemorialDay2016

EYE am going to leave this right here.






Monday, July 27, 2015

#SandraBland


Wednesday, January 21, 2015

The Day after the #SOTU and the Repubs are mad now....#IWonTwice




President Obama didn't call out the republicans (and some democrats) to my satisfaction, but he did  throw some major shade  with a drop the microphone moment  that has republicans begging for cheese to go with their whine
Republicans tried to get snarky with President Obama during the State Of The Union, but were quickly shot down by an off the cuff presidential reply. After the exchange, conservative media cowered and whined about the president’s “rudeness.”
They can dish out the rudeness but they can't take it, and I suspect rudeness  is code for Uppity, but I digress. Obama isn't the first democratic President to throw shade at republicans, but he's the first African American President, and that's what makes them mad.

So how are they going to get Obama for daring get Uppity  I mean rude to them?  Well, first it was the Voting Rights Act now the republican controlled Supreme Court's Poised To Make It Easier To Deny Someone A Home Because They are Black. 

 For four years, civil rights advocates have struggled to keep the Supreme Court from eliminating a key prong of federal fair housing law. This year, their luck is probably going to run out. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. The Inclusive Communities Project, a case that could leave many victims of housing discrimination unable to win their case in court. Based on the justices’ unusual eagerness to hear the issue presented by Inclusive Communities, their decision is likely to end badly for civil rights.
Let's be clear, republicans showed us who/what they really are last night.

They don't want your child(ren) to have access to a quality public education.

They don't want anyone to have access to quality, affordable health care.

They want to build more new prisons than new schools.

They want to recruit our sons and daughters to fight wars based on dead wrong intelligence.

They are against Fair Housing.
 
They are against poor women (not to be confused with rich women) having access to a safe legal abortion.

They are against equal pay for women, heck they against fair pay for period.

They hate us for our freedom.  I thought I would throw that one in for flavor.

This is the party the media enabled to take control of the House and the Senate.

I HOPE they are happy.

Thursday, June 19, 2014

"Clueless White Texas Commissioners Accidentally Vote to Back Slavery Reparations" on Juneteenth

Happy Juneteenth!

Today marks the holiday known variously as Emancipation Day, Freedom Day, Juneteenth Independence Day, or simply Juneteenth. It commemorates the day in 1865 that slaves in Texas were finally set free, more than two years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
Here's an explanation of the holiday's roots from a 1977 issue of Southern Exposure magazine:
The Emancipation Proclamation of January 1, 1863, did not have any effect in Texas because too little of the state was occupied by Northern troops. When Lee surrendered in April, 1865, most Texas plantations were still intact, and a quarter-million black people were working as slaves.
It was not until June 19, 1865 -- when General George Granger arrived with Yankee troops in Galveston and issued his own emancipation decree -- that slaves were actually freed in Texas. June 19 -- "Juneteenth" -- therefore became the day of celebration.
The event became a Texas state holiday in 1980, and today it's recognized as either a state holiday or special day of observance in 43 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
That's right, African Americans didn't find out the Civil War was over, the north won, and they were free, until two years after the war was over.  This is why I report with great glee, that on this day the Dallas County, Texas Commissioners  Unanimously, Mistakenly Approve Reparations For Black Communities.




This is what happen when blacks elected officials are marginalized, minimized, and ignored.

Monday, October 29, 2012

Why would Alabama republicans bar outside observers from Alabama Elections?

According to Alabama Speaker of the House Mike Hubbard (r.), Sweet Home Alabama doesn't need none of them there outside agitators coming down here monitoring our selections, I mean elections.  You would think a party so concerned about voter fraud and ballot security would welcome extra eyes and ears at the polling place.

Well at least the Alabama Speaker of the House isn't threatening to arrest monitors observing the election.  Yet.

I could understand their position if Alabama and our country were the model for fair and free elections, you know.... one man/woman one vote, every vote counts, and the candidate with the most votes wins.

To all republicans who said "If you aren't doing anything wrong you don't have anything to worry about" after 9/11 when Congress passed the Patriot Act, I say, If you aren't doing anything wrong why are you trying to bar outside observers?
 
Deja Voodoo All Over Again?  Must See YouTube.


 

Friday, July 20, 2012

It's Time for Dale Jackson to Put Up or Shut Up

I pledge to use my time and my money to help anyone who wants and ID and doesn't have one to get one.~Dale Jackson July 13,2012 

I will not quit.  I will continue to fight to get people the ID they need to vote because this is the most important issue of our time.~Dale Jackson July 13, 2012

Graphic by  mooncat @LeftinAlabama
In an obvious attempt to gain publicity for himself, and mock voters who will be negatively impacted by the new Voter ID laws being passed by red, republican, controlled legislators and governors in key swing states, including Sweet Home Alabama, WVNN radio talk show host Dale Jackson challenged liberals to stop whining about the Voter ID laws and do something about it. by offering to single-handedly (sic) solve this problem by not only picking up "the poor", taking them to the appropriate agency, paying for their ID and buying them a sandwich..

There was only one problem, Dale needed help identifying the poor and destitute who couldn't obtain an ID, so he enlisted the help of the Alabama Democratic Party, The Alabama Federation of Democratic Women, Limestone County Democrats, and the Madison County Democrats via Facebook.

Refusing to give up Dale even suckered LiA blogger and commentor Dragontide into posting his appeal for help on the font page of Left in Alabama promising to ask Congress Critter Mo Brooks (r), and Alabama Senators Richard Shelby(r) and Jeff Sessions(r) about a nationwide federal program to issue ID's, which Dale reneged on.

Well Dale, you don't have to beg for help identifying the poor, destitute people you claim you are trying to help because the Brennan Center for Justice has done the work for you in a report that list the number of Alabamians who need to be picked up, taken to the appropriate agency so you can to buy them a voter ID card.  

Psst Dale!  Get out your checkbook and write a check for the total cost of the ID card, transportation, and a sandwich  for the number of people in the Tennessee Valley listening area, identified for you in the report, and send it the Brennan Center for Justice so they can help you win the fight to get people the ID they need to vote because this is the most important fight of our time.


32.7%, or 1,137,724, voting age Alabama citizens live more than 10 miles from the nearest state ID-issuing office which is open more than 2 days a week

6.1% of voting age Alabama citizens (213,386) have no vehicle access. 

26.8% of those voting age Alabama citizens with no vehicle access (57,285) also live 10 miles or more from the nearest state ID-issuing office that's open more than 2 days a week

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Reasonable Doubt for Dummies!



A broke clock is right twice a day, and every once in a while our resident righty FED UP gets it right(pun intended), as in this comment regarding the pending execution of Troy Anthony Davis, even though the case against him as fallen apart.

FED UP said;

You DO NOT know that he did not commit that crime and I do not know that he did!

This my friends is REASONABLE DOUBT for Dummies. This is why Troy Davis should not be executed. This is why Troy Davis should be granted a new trial. This is why I am against the death penalty.

Troy Davis and the politics of death.
Troy Davis has three major strikes against him. First, he is an African-American man. Second, he was charged with killing a white police officer. And third, he is in Georgia.

More than a century ago, the legendary muckraking journalist Ida B. Wells risked her life when she began reporting on the epidemic of lynchings in the Deep South. She published “Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases” in 1892 and followed up with “The Red Record” in 1895, detailing hundreds of lynchings. She wrote: “In Brooks County, Ga., Dec. 23, while this Christian country was preparing for Christmas celebration, seven Negroes were lynched in twenty-four hours because they refused, or were unable to tell the whereabouts of a colored man named Pike, who killed a white man ... Georgia heads the list of lynching states.”
None dare call it racism, but the fact remains there are more blacks than whites on death row, because they're well....black.

Barring some miraculous intervention by Gov. Rick Perry, Duane Buck will become the 11th person to be executed this year in Texas’ death chamber and the execution will be wrong—not because of some anti-death penalty view I may have but because his death sentence was definitively the result of race.
Buck, an African-American, was convicted in 1997 for the 1995 double murder of his girlfriend and her companion. During Buck’s 1997 trial, his defense attorney called a psychologist named Walter Quijano who testified during the punishment phase of the trial and who, upon cross examination by prosecutors with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office, stated he believed that because Buck was black, he posed a greater risk of “future dangerousness” in the prison setting. Future dangerousness is a critical factor a capital jury must consider in deciding whether the death penalty is appropriate in a given case.
In 2000 U.S. Senator John Cronyn, then Texas’ attorney general, said that Buck’s case was one of six his office had identified in which Quijano had introduced race into jury deliberations. Then Attorney General Cronyn said that all of the condemned inmates were entitled to a new punishment hearing. Five of those inmates was given new punishment hearings by various federal courts which resulted in each being re-sentenced to death. One of the five has been executed.
Neither state nor federal courts ever ordered a new punishment hearing in Buck’s case. Why Buck’s trial attorney would call a psychologist who had a history of injecting race in the trial process is not readily available in the public record. What is known is that state and federal courts over the last few weeks have rebuffed the determined efforts by Buck’s current attorneys, David Dow and Katherine Black, to secure a new punishment hearing. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday denied Buck’s last legal opportunity to get a new punishment hearing.


Is Duane Buck guilty of the crimes he was convicted of? Yes. Should he be executed because he's black? No. And FED Up, before you tune up your spin machine, just because I oppose the death penalty doesn't mean I want rapist and murderers to go free, or live among civil society. It means I want them to spend the rest of their natural lives in behind bars. I oppose the death penalty because I'm pro life. For real.

Under Politics 101, a conservative governor, especially in Texas, would not intercede in a case that has been rejected by the courts and the pardon board. But these are not normal political circumstances. Gov. Perry is running for the presidency of the United States and has already faced serious media questions about his refusal to stop the 2004 execution of Cameron Todd Willingham, despite compelling evidence indicating the condemned inmate was innocent. The Buck case offers the governor an opportunity to redeem himself, especially among African-Americans who believe the death penalty in Texas unfairly targets blacks. A thirty-day reprieve would not cost the governor a single point among his conservative political base because chances are the courts would not order a new punishment hearing during the reprieve period and the pardon board most certainly would not. Thus, the only thing a reprieve would probably accomplish is a few more months of life for Duane Buck—an insignificant price considering the good will the governor would benefit from granting the reprieve.
As I said in my opening, barring some miraculous intervention by Gov. Perry, Buck will be executed tonight.


Thou Shalt not Kill. That means everybody.
The primary reason God hates murder is that out of all creation, only human are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27; 9:4-6). Even before the codification of the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai the murder of other human beings was wrong (Genesis 4:8-12; 4:23-24; 9:4-6; Exodus 1:16-17). While on earth, Jesus spoke out against murder (Matthew 5:21-26; Mark 10:17-19). We also see in the writings of Paul (Romans 1:18, 29-32; 13:8-10; Galatians 5:19-21), James (James 2:8-11; 4:1-3), Peter (1 Peter 4:15-16) and John (Revelation 9:20-21; 21:7-8; 22:14-15) that murder is wrong.


WWJD?

Monday, September 5, 2011

Catching Up on the News




In case regular readers haven't noticed I didn't post a diary last week. Don't blame me. Blame Direct TV. I'm here to tell you moving with Direct TV is so NOT easy. Customers are at the mercy of under staffed Installers, who contract with Direct TV. Without Direct TV there is no cable television and no Internet, so you are basically at cut off from the outside world.

Being cut off cable television wasn't so bad, but being without the Internet was torture. I'm still playing catch up to see what's been happening in the world. I see the Talking TeeVee Pundit Heads are still talking up Rick Perry and distorting what we decide,while ignoring the right wing terrorist threat.

Gooberner Rick might want to get off the campaign trail and head on home to Texas Burning.
A very strong, cool norther blew into Texas yesterday finally bringing relief from scorching all time record triple digit temps. But it did not bring desperately needed rain and the entire state is a tinder box waiting to ignite. Well it ignited in a big way in Central Texas yesterday in and around Austin, destroying HUNDREDS of homes (at least 400 in the county of Bastrop alone), with fires still completely out of control in many areas. Evacuations are extensive.


You know we are in trouble when Democrats start referring to Social Security and Medicare as Entitlements.
"Entitlement" has a negative sound in colloquial English: somebody who is "entitled" selfishly claims something he doesn't really deserve. Why not call them "earned benefits," which is what they are because we all contribute payroll taxes to fund them? That would never occur to the Democrats. Republicans don't make that mistake; they are relentlessly on message: it is never the "estate tax," it is the "death tax."


Talking about biting off your nose to spite your face, 8 out of the 10 states with the worst economies are red, republican, confederate, slave states. Sweet Home Alabama is #5. Three out of three red, republican states almost made the cut. Maybe if democrats stopped pandering to the right and tell them like it is, voters would stop voting against their self interest.
Republicans will do whatever it takes, by any means necessary, to win. When faced with the same situation, Democrats will agonize, wring their hands, rack themselves with guilt, and seek "fairness" and "compromise." Maybe, just maybe, that's why Republicans seem to win most of the battles, while Democrats lose them.


Which brings me President Obama's upcoming address to congress, which thanks to Ru$h Limbaugh will competes with the NFL season opener. I HOPE I have Direct TV by Thursday night so I can TIVO the game. If not, I'll watch POTUS until he starts talking about compromise and bipartisanship. Here is a prep for the speech.
I will be listening to Obama’s speech. I love his use of mixed metaphors, his attempt at dazzling you with brilliance while baffling you all the while with baloney…which BTW is about the most Americans can afford nowadays. I can not wait for him to use FDR’s acronym “they hate me and I welcome that hatred” and then he will be launching his “tour” to sell his jobs program. More “change we can believe in” …we have no where to go but up….now that the August jobs report is a big fat ZERO. I can picture this… “next month I will create 1000 new jobs and every month there after”…”oops I mean 100,000 new jobs”…I think, maybe let’s hope.
“God bless America…EAT YOUR PEAS NOW!” “Oh…BTW Don’t forget to enter the drawing for dinner with the President along with a donation to my campaign”


I wonder if Florida Guverner Rick Scott is going to apologize to the welfare recipients he made undergo drug testing after he reimburses them? Naah! That would be too much like right (pun intended).

Since the state began testing welfare applicants for drugs in July, about 2 percent have tested positive, preliminary data shows.

Ninety-six percent proved to be drug free -- leaving the state on the hook to reimburse the cost of their tests.


To be continued.

Thursday, July 14, 2011

A Texas Election Judges opinion of the Voter ID laws

I am sharing an email I received from a Texas Election Judge in response to my post, I sure do miss the good old days when we had fair and free elections in America too. I would like to thank the Judge for reading and their informative response.~Redeye

Let me preface this by saying that here in Texas, there has recently been passed a new "Voter ID" law ( :-( ) and I don't know yet how the courts will handle that, or how the details will work. So I'm basing what I'm saying below on the prior law and interpretation.

First of all, at least here in Texas, you DO have to provide SOME kind of identification in order to vote (at least to vote normally).

That said, there is a WIDE variety of identification you can provide. What we are trying to determine is that you are who you say you are, and that you are a registered voter in Dallas County (during early voting) and/or the precinct corresponding to the polling place to you are at (on election day proper). You can use a voter registration card (the preferred ID), Texas Drivers License, active duty military ID, pilots license, passport, concealed carry permit, or more. It's not limited to government issued identification: if it shows your photo and your name (and preferably also your signature) that's cool. I have accepted a Sam's Club card, or even a Six Flags season pass.

The one that bothers ME is that we can (must!) also accept a utility bill... and that has neither a photo NOR a signature. That has the further problem that if the utility bill is in the husband's name, the wife can't vote with it, even though she is also covered by that bill. (Theoretically, someone could go down the street and pull utility bills out of the mailboxes on the day they're being delivered, and then use that as ID to vote for all their neighbors!)

Personally, I'm (not surprisingly) an election integrity advocate (and that's a big part of why I work as an election judge).

I want to make sure that the voter presenting themselves at the poll to vote IS the person who they claim to be. Obviously, we check on the computer (during early voting) or in the poll book (on election day) to verify that the person is registered and their voter egistration is active. If the voter has not yet signed their voter registration card, I ask them to sign it in front of me, and I verify that signature against the signature on their driver's license (which
of course is always signed). After the voter signs the application for voting (during early voting) or the combination form (on election day) I check to make sure that the signature appears to be signed by the same hand as that which signed their reference ID.

Personally, I think a photo ID is much less good than a signature
verification... if I were to cut off my beard and long hair, I wouldn't look anything like my previous picture, but my signature would still match... or if someone had an identical twin, they might look EXACTLY the same, but their signature won't match. So I qualify the voters by always confirming their signature, if possible (again, under current law, I have to accept a utility bill, which doesn't have a signature on it). The important thing is that I as election judge am convinced that the person IS who they claim to be.

I will point out that I've been working as an election judge for more than ten years, and the supposed problem of people trying to vote as someone else simply DOES NOT OCCUR (or at least not in the numbers that would ever change an election's results). This whole Voter ID law initiative, I think, is an attempt to divert attention away from where the real problems are (or MIGHT be), to where they are not.

As I understand things, the new Texas Voter ID law requires that the name on the Drivers License or other official voting ID presented matches the name on the voter registration. Very often (and more often for women than men) the names on the two databases (drivers license database vs. voter registration database) are not styled the same way. It remains to be seen what allowances we will make for that.

Here in Texas, at least, if you do not adequately identify yourself (whatever that involves) you can still vote (if you insist) but that will be a "provisional" ballot, and if you did not present a satisfactory ID, it is safe to predict that your vote WILL NOT BE COUNTED. (The actual determination is officially made by the Ballot Board, but the rule is that voters not presenting proper ID is one sufficient cause for not counting their ballot).

There is some feeling that the newly passed Texas Voter ID law will be thrown out by the courts. That remains to be seen, too.

There are other things that we need to change to make the voting more reliable, auditable, and trustworthy. I've discussed those here before, but that would be off topic for THIS reply, at least.