Reviewed by Charles Kiker, Ph. D., American Baptist Minister (retired)
Unless you can stand deep soul-searching, don’t read this book.
Emmett Till’s body was exhumed in Illinois almost a half century after his murder in Mississippi, to try to ascertain whether there might be evidence involving anyone other than Roy Bryant and J. W. Milam in the murder. Bryant and Milam had been acquitted in a trial in 1955 in which the jury deliberated only 67 minutes. Milam had died in 1980 and Bryant in 1994, so they could not be tried in federal court. But might there be someone else who could be?
Although it does not ascribe a starring role to Emmett Till, it is fitting that this book begins with a description of the exhumation of the body of Emmett Till in 2005, a half century after his murder.
Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 set the stage, but that day in December, 1955 when Rosa Parks refused to go to the back of the bus in Montgomery, Alabama could well be designated as the beginning of the civil rights struggles of the 1950s and 1960s. But America’s attention was riveted on Jim Crow by the murder of fourteen year old Emmett Till a few months earlier in August, 1955. The murder and the rapid acquittal of the murderers reportedly stiffened the spine of Rosa Parks for her stand against segregation. The murder of Emmett Till was an important milestone in my own development regarding race relations. (more…)
It is worth remembering the pervasive fear in late 2001 and how immediate the threat felt. Just as week after the September 11 attacks, powdered anthrax was sent to various news organizations and to two U.S. Senators. The American public was shocked by news of new terrorist plots and elevations of the color-coded threat level of the Homeland Security Advisory System. We expected further attacks against the nation.
The implication is clear: Although our report bristles with official lies, cover-ups, brutality, idiocy and systematic sadism, the Senator’s suggest, none of this should be seen as reflecting badly on the national character. We were a traumatized and fearful nation and we just . . . well . . . we pushed the envelope a bit. You will be appalled, disgusted, even outraged by what you read in these pages, but the folks responsible for the blatant misconduct described therein meant well. They were good, honorable Americans like you and me: ordinary people living in extraordinary times.
The report argues, persuasively I believe, that no actionable intelligence was derived from the “enhanced interrogation techniques” (aka “torture”) employed by the CIA and other representatives of the United States of America. The authors aren’t saying that the information produced by water boarding, rectal re-hydration (aka “anal rape”), sleep deprivation and all the rest produced information of dubious value. They are saying that torture was completely useless as an intelligence-gathering tool.
I suspect they’re right about that. But the insistence that torture produced nary a shred of good intelligence reflects the hidden fear that, if the American public thought sadistic brutality would make them even a tiny bit safer, they would condone it in a heartbeat. (more…)
Glancing at the paper this morning over breakfast, I noticed the headline, “Race relations arguably worse in ‘Age of Obama'”.
That banal conclusion is based on a recent poll suggesting that 43% of Americans believe that having an African-American president has not helped race relations, while only 34% believe it has helped.
This assumes that race relations–white folks and people of color getting along–is what we’re shooting for. It isn’t. (more…)
The shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson and the choking death of Eric Garner in Staten Island have dominated the news cycle for weeks, making it almost impossible to get any other issue onto the agenda. Immigration, Ebola and ISIS have all been reduced to the status of warm-up acts.
The death of Eric Garner has riveted the nation because we have the video. A few voices on the hard right are defending Daniel Pantaleo’s use of the choke hold, arguing that it was somehow Mr. Garner’s fault for being obese and having high blood pressure. But most commentators, regardless of ideological persuasion, are baffled by the grand jury’s decision. Even when the footage is grainy, the camera doesn’t lie.
The Michael Brown story has captured the lion’s share of media attention precisely because we don’t have the video. (more…)
Fifteen women now claim to have been drugged and raped by Bill Cosby. Asked to respond to these allegations on NPR, Cosby maintained an indignant silence.
The kind of white liberals who love NPR (I am one of these) love Bill Cosby. That is likely why most readers who cared enough to respond sharply criticized Scott Simon for asking a question that was irrelevant to the interview.
Since it is unlikely that Bill Cosby would give an interview specifically related to his alleged sexual violence, it is hard to imagine how Cosby could ever be forced to answer his accusers.
White liberals love Bill Cosby because he represents a racially reconciled America where African Americans, thank God Almighty, finally have their piece of the pie. The Cosby Show portrayed a hyper-functional Black family that listened to Ray Charles and reminisced about the march on Washington, while maintaining a egalitarian marriage, exercising strict family disciple and getting along swimmingly with white people.
As a young adult, I loved the Cosby Show. As a child, I laughed myself silly over Cosby’s stand-up routines: “Noah: How long can you tread water?” Cosby’s blackness was central to my pleasure. Here was a black man who transcended racist stereotype. Cosby was a role model, a walking embodiment of our best values. And he was really, really funny.
That’s why I was so disappointed to hear the sainted comedian unleash a campaign against low-income black people, the folks at the opposite end of the social spectrum from Cliff and Claire Huxtable who failed where Cliff and Claire had succeeded so brilliantly. Cosby’s contempt for black people who neglected their kids, didn’t get an education, who lacked a work ethic, and blamed others for their own failings knew no bounds. (more…)
The Mississippi Supreme Court just decided, after a 5-4 vote, that Curtis Flowers does not deserve a new trial due to racial bias in the jury selection process. I wasn’t surprised. After a black juror was accused of perjury and obstruction of justice at the end of the fifth murder trial Curtis has endured, black members of the venire were understandably eager to avoid jury duty. White jurors, by contrast, were eager to serve.
The only surprise was that four justices appear to understand that this case has horribly irregular from the beginning. Since the sixth trial, for instance, one of the state’s star witnesses has been convicted of massive income tax fraud while another has committed a triple murder (with a fourth victim confined to a wheel chair).
The Mississippi Supreme Court once functioned as a check on prosecutor Doug Evans and Judge Joey Loper. That is no longer the case. To find out why, read on. AGB 11-5-17
At the risk of offending people of good will everywhere, I will ask the appropriate question in the appropriate manner: “Is it a crime to kill a nigger in Mississippi?”
If the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the 2010 conviction of Curtis Flowers is any indication, the answer to this distressing question is still “no”.
Bill Waller as Mississippi Governor
My offensive framing of the question hails back to the 1964 trial of Myron De La Beckwith, the man accused of killing civil rights leader, Medgar Evers. Prosecutor Bill Waller had the thankless task of prosecuting a man who was being hailed as a hero in his home town of Greenwood, Mississippi. To have any chance of attaining a conviction, Waller had to signal to the courtroom that he shared their disapproval of Medgar Evers and the movement he symbolized. But he also had to find twelve men (women didn’t serve on Mississippi juries in 1964) who believed it was a crime for a white man to kill a black man. So every prospective juror was asked the same question. Here’s how it went the first time round.
“Do you think it’s a crime to kill a nigger in Mississippi?” Waller asked one potential juror.
After a long silence, the judge demanded an answer.
More silence.
“He’s thinking it over,” Mr. Waller said.
The African Americans in the gallery gasped and moaned in dismay every time the hated word was uttered, but Waller got the jury he was looking for.
Why were Democrats so thoroughly humiliated in the 2014 election? Analysts have been warning for months that this would be a tough year for the Blue team, but few expected the carnage to be this bad (or good, depending on your perspective).
The question is particularly pressing in Texas where Wendy Davis, the Democratic candidate for governor, lost by twenty points despite prodigious fund-raising success and massive GOTV support from groups like Battleground Texas.
Few expected Davis to win; but twenty points?
By the numbers, Davis lost because more 80% of key demographic groups voted for Republican Greg Abbott: white males, white evangelical Christians, voters who believe government is too big and that abortion should be illegal.
But Davis also lost because voters who normally help Democrats stayed home.
Davis didn’t do well with younger voters and did really badly with older voters. Only 6% of the electorate was between 18 and 24 and Greg Abbott received 59% of the votes of Texans between 25-29, 45% in the 30-39 category, 57% in the 40-49 group, and close to 70% support from voters 50 and older.
Only 61% of Latino woman supported Davis while Latino men actually favored Abbot, albeit by a single percentage point. Over all, Davis got only 25% of the white vote, 92% of the black vote and 55% of the Latino vote.
Latino support for Leticia Van de Putte, candidate for Lieutenant Governor, was also embarrassingly weak. While Latino women favored Leticia 58%-40%, Latino men backed Dan Patrick, an outspoken opponent of immigration reform, 53% to 46%. These results are particularly mystifying when you realize that Van de Putte is a Latina who switches effortlessly between English and Spanish.
If Democrats were shredded from sea to shining sea, the results in Texas were particularly depressing for a party boasting its intention to “turn Texas blue.”
So, why did it happen.
The big story is that only 28.5% of eligible Texas voters showed up at the polls. Texas has always been a low-voting state, but 28.5% suggests an alarming level of disengagement. White evangelicals showed up in droves, comprising 30% of the Texas electorate (according to exit polls), and 84% of them voted for the Republican.
Even if every single evangelical voter had stayed home, Davis would have eked out a narrow victory.
When you can’t win 30% of the white vote, it doesn’t matter how well you do with young people and Latinos.
Election results make it clear that Latinos who care about immigration and young people generally stayed home.
It is tempting for Democrats to castigate their supporters for sitting this one out, but that’s precisely the wrong approach. What did Democrats do, in Texas or nationwide, to give young people and non-white voters a reason to vote?
As things presently stand, the Democrats are a party without a message, And no, “the Tea Party is crazy and we’re not” doesn’t count.
When Obamacare survived a horrendous roll-out and registered a series of smashing successes, Republicans doubled down on their criticism. When Democrats failed to defend their leader’s signature policy success, the only story in town came from Republican politicians and pundits: “Obamacare is horribly, shockingly, disgustingly awful!!!!”
Democrats begged Obama to avoid action on immigration until after the election. The result: low turnout from frustrated Latino electorate and the loss of a hot campaign issue. Sure, immigration is controversial, but the majority of American support both the Affordable Care Act and immigration reform.
A party without a message can’t compete with a party sporting simple talking points and a high degree of message discipline. It doesn’t matter if most Republican positions are demonstrably wrong–if no one beats the drum for the alternative, Democrats will stay home and Republicans will score lopsided wins.
Texas Democrats won’t win 40% of the white evangelical vote in the foreseeable future, but if they can’t do better than 16%, the Republican hegemony could extend into the second half of the twentieth century.
White evangelicals see Democrats as the party of secularism, and if we restrict our attention to white Democrats a case can be made for this proposition. But the anti-God label is hilariously off-target if Latino and African American voters are taken into account.
Show up at a Black or Latino church and you will realize that Republicans have no corner on spirituality; but too many white Democrats, in my experience, have come to see religion as the enemy. That needs to change.
Wendy Davis was doomed form the outset because abortion rights, in Texas, is a political loser. Greg Abbott’s position on abortion is surprisingly moderate, but the “abortion Barbie” label killed Davis in the heartland.
Unfortunately, much of the political money that flooded Texas came from people determined to make the abortion issue front and center. The only way to protect women’s access to health care, long term, is to vote moderate candidates into positions of power. In the end, Davis was forced to run away from abortion rights, gun control, immigration reform and virtually every other progressive issue. She was a candidate without a message and her plight presented an egregious example of what ails Democrats across the nation.
Here’s the bottom line: democrats will become competitive in Texas the minute they give young people and Latinos a reason to vote. That didn’t happen in 2014 and it won’t happen in 2016 unless we see dramatic change.
Unless you can stand deep soul-searching, don’t read this book.
Friends of Justice 