Police State related program Activities

You say there is an investigation of voter fraud in the state of Florida, no shit? Are they looking at Harris? No, Absentee ballots you say. Do they think that there was some hanky panky with the military vote? No. Oh I'll have to guess that black folk are involved - did I win? ding ding ding.

Apparently there is an "investigation" involving "absentee" ballots cast by elderly black folk, including door to door visits by the state police, to conduct "interviews" leading some to reach this conclusion:

"One woman asked me, 'Am I going to go to jail now because I voted by absentee ballot?' "

A conclusion I am sure that the guardians of the democratic process in Florida, would like these folks to reach. From Herbert at the NYT:

The state police officers, armed and in plain clothes, have questioned dozens of voters in their homes. Some of those questioned have been volunteers in get-out-the-vote campaigns.

I asked Mr. Morales in a telephone conversation to tell me what criminal activity had taken place.

"I can't talk about that," he said.

I asked if all the people interrogated were black.

"Well, mainly it was a black neighborhood we were looking at - yes,'' he said.

He also said, "Most of them were elderly."

When I asked why, he said, "That's just the people we selected out of a random sample to interview."

So we have an inability to discuss an ongoing investigation, which happens all the time when the victims of crime are white and pregnant, then by some bizarro world coincidence it turns out that the people being intimidated interviewed are mostly black and mostly elderly, and chosen at random----Yeah that's the ticket....

Back in the bad old days, some decades ago, when Southern whites used every imaginable form of chicanery to prevent blacks from voting, blacks often fought back by creating voters leagues, which were organizations that helped to register, educate and encourage black voters. It became a tradition that continues in many places, including Florida, today.

Not surprisingly, many of the elderly black voters who found themselves face to face with state police officers in Orlando are members of the Orlando League of Voters, which has been very successful in mobilizing the city's black vote.

The president of the Orlando League of Voters is Ezzie Thomas, who is 73 years old. With his demonstrated ability to deliver the black vote in Orlando, Mr. Thomas is a tempting target for supporters of George W. Bush in a state in which the black vote may well spell the difference between victory and defeat.

The vile smell of voter suppression is all over this so-called investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

What is so vile about these measures is that many of these black florida voters have only been allowed to exercise their right to vote without fear of reprisal since 1965 and the passage of the voting rights act. Why did we need a VRA in 1965? Lets just say that the 14th and 15th amendments, after Plessy v ferguson, meant little in the south. Also that goons like a young Renquist (your chief justice and mine) liked to rough up and intimidate black folk that had the audacity to pay a poll, tax pass their literacy tests, and still have the temerity to vote. I'll dig up a link on Renquist later, suffice it to say that if you lived in the south and were a victim of excess melanin, you did not have the right to vote.

Such disfranchising laws included poll taxes, literacy tests, vouchers of "good character" and disqualification for "crimes of moral turpitude." These laws were "color-blind" on their face, but were designed to exclude black citizens disproportionately by allowing white election officials to apply the procedures selectively. Other laws and practices, such as the "white primary", attempted to evade the 15th Amendment by allowing "private" political parties to conduct elections and establish qualifications for their members.

It has always been somewhat interesting to me that while the 13th amendment abolished the practice of slavery, the 14th gave the former slaves citizenship, why would the 15th be necessary if the rights of citizens include the vote. You see some crackers need things spelled out real clear like I guess.
But whats dreally cool is that in the Jim Crow south they got away with the suppression of the black vote like the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments did not matter. Nearly 100 years of supression and they did such a good job that the constitution had to be amended again enter the 24th.

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Compare with the 15th

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

See the similarities. This is why I wish that the Framers had specifically enumerated the right of privacy in the bill of rights. Because if it is not in the constitution, you have asshats who are likely to conclude that privacy isn't a right, just like 125 years ago some asshat said to himeself that "hey they didn't say none such 'bout poll tax in that mendment, thats how well keep the niggers from voting."
Power mad asshats on the loose, I hope you have a sturdy umbrella.
Clinton had it right "they have to divide us to win"

The Proud Southern Tradition, is a skidmark on the bowl of history, sorry guys, you gotta quit hanging on, its Ugly.