Uppity-Negro.com

I did used to write about that stuff, didn't I?

Y'know, like I'd link to, say, Jim Crow revived in cyberspace by Greg Palast and Martin Luther King III, pointing out that I noticed the piece at BlackElectorate, and quote some relevant bit of the thing:

In the two years before the [November 2000] elections, the Florida secretary of state's office quietly ordered the removal of 94,000 voters from the registries. Supposedly, these were convicted felons who may not vote in Florida. Instead, the overwhelming majority were innocent of any crime, though just over half were black or Hispanic. We are not guessing about the race of the disenfranchised: A voter's color is listed next to his or her name in most Southern states. (Ironically, this racial ID is required by the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a King legacy.)

[. . .] Voters whose name, birth date and gender loosely matched that of a felon anywhere in America were targeted for removal. And so one Thomas Butler (of several in Florida) was tagged because a "Thomas Butler Cooper Jr." of Ohio was convicted of a crime. The legacy of slavery -- commonality of black names -- aided the racial bias of the "scrub list."

And then add some snarky comment or other. An attack on Katherine Harris' makeup, perhaps.

I'm not saying this isn't a serious and very disturbing direction for the country to be headed in -- and the focus of the article is looking forward to the effects of the "Help America Vote Act," which might replicate the Florida debacle nationwide unless something is done about it -- but as the title of the article states up front, this is an old battle.

And given our current system, it's hard to work up much enthusiasm for fighting for voting rights. God knows most people in this country who have them don't bother using them.

The problem is, the old battle wasn't really won. I don't get the feeling that the civil rights movement was about racially integrating an otherwise-unchanged society, and I think I lifted that phrase or that entire sentence from a much better author, so please don't quote me, and if you can find an attribution, let me know.

And as usual, I have no conclusion for this, because I haven't made up my mind on things yet. There was much defeatist nonsense, edited out because it looked morose even to me.

Right. More coffee for me.