It's the 4th Amendment Stupid

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

-4th Amendment to the US Constitution


Heather Mac Donald, the local "expert" on black crime is apparently out turning tricks for the NYT today. I know that's harsh but I have such little respect for this woman, who I say she is whoring for attention and the NYT is her latest john. I've dealt with Ms. MacDonald before So I'll leave it to the reader to go there and see why I am so harsh on this woman. However; in this case I must point out the obvious flaw in Mac Donald's argument.

Nowhere in her opinion piece for the NYT does Heather Mac Donald even discuss that most of the people stopped and frisked by the NYPD have done nothing to warrant being stopped and therefore their 4th Amendment rights are being violated. Often multiple times. They are simply black (or brown) and often making "other" kinds of behavior that allegedly constitutes probable cause. No, to mention that would be to inconvenient for Mac Donald's argument about "where crime is".

I suppose Heather Mac Donald comes to use via a time machine where she thinks Dred Scott is still in effect. Well at least legally. I'm sorry to break it to Heather but the NYPD's Stop and harass policy is unconstitutional and unfortunately the so called leadership of NYS and NYC are afraid to call it what it is and stop it.

I suppose it doesn't bother Heather Mac Donald that 95+% of the people stopped have not only not done anything, were not in the process of committing a crime and shockingly had no weapons or other contraband on them at the time of harassment. It's stuff like that which got the state of New Jersey in trouble. Essentially you cannot claim "this is where crime happens" as an excuse to end run the 4th Amendment.

So the next time Heather Mac Donald gets to writing about black crime, someone ought to remind her of that little document called the U.S. Constitution.

Joseph Nevins is on Crack

I swear that the advocates for illegal immigrants make more and more absurd arguments with each passing day. To be sure, straight up White Supremacists give them a whole lot of ammo with their clear xenophobic rantings, but the arguments that come from the supposedly intelligent left also give much ammo to those who oppose them. Even I have to wonder at times whether these individuals think that a law is wrong simply because it inconveniences them or a family member.

Like for example a piece I read online some time ago about a couple that met on a cruise ship. She was a citizen of another country and he a US citizen (how, I don't care). They fell in love and decided to marry. One problem was that her visa was a work visa and specifically tied to the ship she was on. They didn't want to "wait" for the process of legal immigration so she decided to violate the terms of her visa and stay in the US. The consequences for this, which apparently were known by both parties, was not only that she risked immediate deportation should she be caught, but upon return to her country of origins, she could not re-enter the US for at least 10 years. Sucks doesn't it.

Of course rather than blame themselves for walking head first into such a situation, they want to blame US immigration. See this is what bothers me about most of the so called "immigrant rights" groups that I read about. People make decisions to enter the US knowing full well that they are breaking US law. They do not care. They are willing to take the chance. And hey I admire that. But the flip side, is if enforcement finds you, the gig is up. The host country owes no-one who violates their immigration law, nothing but a return trip. It's even written in the UN Declaration of Human Rights. Read it.

The source of today's rant was a piece in Counterpunch by Joseph Nevins where he, like a few others compare the issues that Illegal immigrants with the Civil Rights Movement.

This time, however, the target is not Jim Crow, but what some have referred to as Juan Crow. Like its pre-Civil Rights cousin, it, too, is effectively a system of apartheid. It is one that denies “illegal” immigrants many basic rights—no matter how long they have been present in this country. And just as in the 1960s, fundamental decency—one informed by an expansive notion of human rights—requires a dismantling of this unjust system.

No my friend, the enforcement of US immigration law, not even to get into the issues of identity fraud, are in no way shape or form equivalent to aparthied South Africa. It is an insult to both African-Americans and South-Africans to string these two things in the same paragraph.

You'll note that Joseph here has to use the term "expansive notion" of human rights, because he knows like I know that the UN Declaration of Human Rights does not support his argument.

I won't repeat the discussion of the UN DOHR here but in reference to the above quote, a person who violates immigration law of a given country, in this case illegal entry, is in violation of that law so long as he or she remains in that country. For those having a hard time wrapping your head around this let me give another example.

In NYS if your car insurance lapses you are required to pay a fine of $5 per day (it's probably more now) that you do not have insurance. Not having car insurance is a "rolling offense" in that you are not just guilty on the day it was reported you are guilty for every subsequent day you go without insurance.

Similarly with illegal residence in any country. That presence is illegal at all times. To be more blunt, Legally every person who in in a country illegally whether it is by overstaying their visa or jumping a fence is a fugitive from the law. Length of stay is no argument against this. Just like you can't say to the NYSDMV that you shouldn't have to pay the fine for lack of insurance because you never had an accident during that time.

Moving on:

This era’s would-be Greensboro took place at Senator John McCain’s Tucson office—on May 17, the 56th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Brown vs. the Topeka Board of Education decision...The action led to the arrest of four youths for trespassing. As three of them are unauthorized immigrants, Pima County sheriffs subsequently turned them over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). ICE released them the next day, but they will have to appear before a judge at a later date, and face possible deportation to their countries of birth.

This guy is straight faced comparing the decision that legally desegregated schools in the US, which currently enrolls students regardless of immigration or citizenship status, to the issue of deportation? Really? My other cheek is stinging right now.

Even worse, the organizers showed a complete lack of concern for the four boys now facing deportation. Unlike the Greensboro sit-ins where citizens were exercising their rights as citizens and who could not face deportation or trespassing unless somehow trespass laws apply to public spaces (I'm not a lawyer), these fellows, as discussed above were already committing a Federal Civil infraction.

Let me detour for a minute here. The reason immigration is not a legal "crime" in the US is because criminal defendants have more "rights" than one in a civil court. Not only is the burden of proof less in a civil proceeding (preponderance of the evidence vs. beyond reasonable doubt) but they can be handled by administrative judges (no jury) and other things that allow for an expedited process.Anyway, back to the story.

By putting these 4 young men on the radar, they guaranteed that they would be picked up by ICE. The law is clear that once lawful contact is made with a person, their citizenship status may be ascertained by law enforcement. This has always been the case, even before the new Arizona law. That is not going to change regardless to what amnesty occurs. So I have little sympathy for the four, unless they were not informed of the additional risk they faced by coming into voluntary contact with law enforcement. Even my mother, a legalized citizen has said on many occasions that it is "not wise" to bring legal attention to yourself while you are not documented.

Joseph then forwards the "Great Lie":

That the young people risked such draconian punishment to champion what is ultimately a very modest legislative measure speaks to the deep-seated frustration among immigrant communities and advocates in a climate of growing repression of non-citizens living in the United States, and the dim prospects for significant change.

The great lie here is the "climate of repression of non-citizens living in the United States."
An utter and complete lie. First and foremost, not every non-citizen is an illegal immigrant. Some are resident aliens (that is a legal term). Some are permanent aliens. They have not sought US citizenship but remain in the US. Then you have plain ol' visitors who are here for work and tourism. To conflate all non-citizens with illegal/undocumented immigrants is a "great lie". Are there segments of US society that have issues with, say, H1B visas which import computer science engineers from India displacing (perhaps) US born engineers? Certainly. And why should they NOT be concerned with such a practice?

Moving on:

While critics of extra-legal migration typically resist attempts to liken efforts to enhance immigrant rights with the efforts of African Americans to end Jim Crow, matters of citizenship were also at the center of the Civil Rights movement. It was precisely because white society treated African Americans as, at best, second-class citizens which necessitated the struggle against institutionalized racism. And just as today, supporters of the then-status quo pointed to the law as a way of perpetuating its ugly reality and criticizing those who would defy it.

Extra-legal? I do believe that is the first I've heard that particular phrase used. But again with the Jim Crow. Let me clue Joseph in to the differences here. Black Americans are not immigrants to America (we'll ignore certain historical things for the time being). Secondly they legally had the same rights as every other citizen (certainly they had all the obligations). Their citizenship rights and privileges were being illegally abridged by the states. The CRM was not about gaining rights that they didn't have. The CRM was about getting the states to stop abridging those rights in blatant violation of the constitution.

Immigrants are guests in a country. They are allowed in under specific circumstances and are allowed to enjoy such hospitality so long as they agree to the terms of entry. violation of the terms of entry result in deportation. This is universally known. What illegal immigrants who follow Joseph are asking for is to not have to abide by the rules of entry. They feel that they are special. They deserve some special treatment that other immigrant who went "by the book" don't even get. In fact many of them are currently getting privileges that citizens cannot get. Some states hand out drivers licenses to persons who clearly do not have Social Security cards or other proof of ID. Citizens can't do that.

More:

Citizenship is ultimately about membership. Whether we like it or not, immigrants—“illegal” and “legal”—are members of American society and should be fully treated as such. They live and work here, and make myriad contributions, while reaping a disproportionately small share of the benefits given their lack of formal citizenship rights. That such inequality is legally enshrined makes it no more just than laws of previous eras such as those against interracial marriage or the right of women to vote.

I suppose then that Joseph is a proponent of giving corporations person status. After all they "work" and "live" here and make a myriad of contributions. Or perhaps toss the distinction between a foreign entity and a domestic one. After all, as far as he's concerned so long as you live and work here you should be a citizen. In fact how about anyone who has lived and worked anywhere just declare themselves a citizen and be done with it. Elections ought to be really fun then.

In reality Joseph simply does not believe in immigration law at all. He should just say so. As far as he's concerned the US (and I assume only the US) ought to simply grant citizenship to any and all who request it. Lets stop with the charade about civil rights and such. If Joseph does believe that a country, including the US, has a right to determine not only who can be a citizen but how many people may immigrate into the country at any given time, then he must also agree that the state would have the right to enforce it's immigration laws. And once he agrees to that, he would find himself on the other side of his own argument. But that's not the point here.

The point here is that advocates for "extra-legal" immigrants would be better served to not compare their issue with the Civil Rights Movement. Doing so really underscores the lack of understanding as to what the Civil Rights Movement was about and alienates those of us who do know what it is about.

BP and Iran

From Counterpunch:

What goes around comes around. One of the greatest bailouts in history came in 1953, when the Eisenhower administration authorized a CIA-backed coup in Iran. The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, owned by the British government, had been expropriated and nationalized in 1951 by unanimous vote of Iran’s parliament. The ’53 coup evicted prime minister Mohammed Mossadeq and installed Shah Reza Pahlevi, the creature of the West’s oil companies , with full tyrannical powers. The AIOC got back 40 per cent of its old concession and became an internationally owned consortium, renamed… British Petroleum.

So when we see all the talk about Iran and sanctions please do keep the above in mind.

Don't Count On It

So I found this gem sitting in my twitter timeline.

The linked piece has a slideshow of different women holding signs about what they would do if they had that alleged:

There’s a $10,622 gap between the median yearly earnings of men and women. That’s $10,622 less per year for women and their families in a difficult economy.

Now the truth of that statement is that the $10,622 is a statistical median. This means half of the women have a much smaller gap or are out-earning men and the other half have a greater deficit. But the odds of a random woman on the street actually being paid 10 grand less than men of equal position, time on the job, etc. are very slim. So it is rather amusing to see random women, whom we know nothing of their actual employment situation, holding up signs about what they would do with 10 grand as if somehow they individually are owed 10 grand. And the quote implies somehow that some nefarious man group up and decided that since the market has collapsed they'll stick to women by paying them even less (never mind that men have been seeing the short end of the employment stick since the Great Crash(tm) )

I could take a picture of what I would do with 10 grand, but honestly I can't even prove that I am being paid less than what I should be SIMPLY based on my race. So the pictures of women with babies may pull at the heartstrings but I seriously doubt any of them are actually owed anything close to that amount as individuals.

Of course this slide show could explain why certain women feel that Ellen Woods is entitled to $3/4 billion from Tiger Woods.

Jonathan Cook Joins Richard Cohen in Dumb Land

He argues, in defense of Helen Thomas:

But 62 years on from Israel’s creation, most Jewish citizens have no home to go to in Poland and Germany -- or in Iraq and Yemen, for that matter. There is also an uncomfortable echo in her words of the chauvinism underpinning demands from some Jews -- and many Israelis -- that Palestinians should “go home to the 22 Arab states”.

No you twit. That Jews from Germany or Poland up and left their property and lives in those countries to take up residence in land stolen from others does not give some kind of squatters rights to stay.

You left your home to invade someone else land? Well sucks to be you. And it doesn't even compare to the argument that Palestinians ought to go back to the "22 Arab States".

Look fool it's called Palestine. They're called Palestinians. What part of that don't you understand?

And this fellow fashions himself to be a supporter of Helen Thomas and a liberal of sorts. That's why I cannot stand most of these white liberals. Always being paternalistic to "colored folk" (and we'll give Helen a pass for now) who speak contrary to the White Liberal Orthodoxy(tm).

What Richard Cohen Missed

Yesterday I saw this piece by Richard Cohen entitled "What Helen Thomas Missed" In what was a largely accurate but entirely irrelevant piece in regards to the "flotilla incident".

Thomas, of Lebanese ancestry and almost 90, has never been shy about her anti-Israel views, for which, as far as I'm concerned, she is wrong and to which she is entitled. Then the other day, she performed a notable public service by revealing how very little she knew.

To take my cue from Cohen let's rewrite his intro paragraph:

Cohen of apparent Jewish ancestry and who-the-fuck knows what age but certainly old has never been shy to apologize for Israeli actions and other acts of racism for which, as far as I'm concerned, He is wrong and to which he is entitled. Then the other day he performed a notable public service by yet again showing how totally racist he is.

I certainly don't think that the Washington Post would allow a columnist to post an intro like that (disregarding the F-bomb) 'cause I doubt they would find it appropriate to or even relevant to discuss Cohen's supposed Jewishness, age or consistent "Anti-Palestinian" views. But hey, He's writing for the Washington post and I'm complaining on a blog. Such is life.

Here is the meat of Cohen's argument:

In the Polish city of Kielce, on July 4, 1946 -- more than a year after the end of the war -- rumors of a Jewish ritual murder triggered a pogrom in which 42 Jewish Holocaust survivors were killed. The Kielce murders were not, by any means, the sole example of why Jews could not "go home." When I visited the Polish city where my mother had been born, Ostroleka, I was told of a Jew who survived Auschwitz only to be murdered when he tried to reclaim his business. In much of Eastern Europe, Jews feared for their lives.

Sounds good until you realize that the above has shit to do with Palestinians. And the above point is what the Iranian president has been badly presenting when he discusses the subject. That Europeans committed atrocities against Jews is not for the Palestinians or any other group of people to be made to make up for. Period.

Not a single Palestinian was involved with that Polish Pogrom.

Not a single Palestinian was involved in Nazi Germany or any of the sympathetic states.

So quite honestly, if they didn't give a damn it would be well within their rights. Take that argument up with the people who actually committed the crimes.

There is a reason why out of all the "Western" people, white Americans are especially attached to Israel. Israel is a little America. America was founded in large part by persons escaping persecution in Europe. They were tired of being harassed by the Church for having the gall to interpret the Bible differently. They set sail for that rumored land over the sea where they could make a fresh start. Of course the problem was that people already lived there. Undeterred these colonists decided that the people living in the "Americas" were backward heathens who's purpose prior to their arrival was to prep the land for them. Their vision of Christianity moralized the subsequent theft of land, relocation, reservations and genocide as the white man's burden.

Today a great deal of white America sees the current republic as a testament to the rightness of such manifest destiny ideology and I believe the story of Israel stirs the same primal "patriot" emotions. Israel being founded by Europeans seeking to relieve themselves of the oppression of Christian, Anti-Semitic Europe, went and grabbed land clearly inhabited by other people. They stole their property, created reservations, broken treaties, etc. Clearly Israel is a little Jewish America. Cohen, who I will assume is an American, therefore has a double dose of this white manifest mentality and it shows.

Lastly, there is an absurdity to Cohen talking about 1946 Poland. That's like a black guy going into a Starbucks and looking for the Negro section of the store. How one whips out some 50 odd year old event as proof that European Jews ought to stay put in occupied Palestine is beyond dumb.

Let me take the time to respond to the asinine comparison made in the comments section of the offending article where some prick asked if it is not OK to tell Blacks to go back to Africa, then....

Stop.

Africans in America, recent immigrants aside, did not come here voluntarily.
We did not get a papal bull, Company Charter or UN mandate to come to America and appropriate land inhabited by other people.

So enough with the black people comparisons.

In the end Cohen's piece is irrelevant. Had Cohen simply decided to discuss past atrocities in Europe and perhaps how they may be avoided if Jews did return to such places, you know, a useful discussion, and left the attack on Helen Thomas out I wouldn't have much to say. But his opening attack on Thomas, and by extension those who agree with her reveals the piece for what it is, a propaganda piece to justify the settler state that is Israel. Besides what happened in Poland is particularly irrelevant for those Jews in Israel who came from the US. What's their excuse?

Legal Jim Crow

There’s reason for the preacher’s strong language. In the fourth chapter (titled “The Cruel Hand”) of The New Jim Crow, Alexander shows how once you’re branded as a felon, all the “old forms of discrimination – employment discrimination, housing discrimination, denial of the right to vote, denial of educational opportunity, denial of food stamps and other public benefits, and exclusion from jury service – are suddenly legal. As a criminal,” Alexander observes, “you have scarcely more rights, and arguably less respect, than a black man living in Alabama at the height of Jim Crow.”[2]

The One's Sitting in Your Face

A bit before Slim Thugg decided to represent "nawfside" and make mostly unsupportable claims in a Vibe magazine interview, I had a thought going through my head that I had refused to post. However; since it has found it's way into my face I suppose it is my Karma to put it out there. I'll use their words though:

Most of us know a beautiful, intelligent, 30-something black woman who swears she can't find a man, in spite of the fact that she might likely know several men who would marry her at the drop of a dime. In some cases, her perception of the perfect man is elevated to the point that every man she meets misses the mark (except for unavailable ones).

-Black Voices

And I will add that many men fall into that same thing as well.

Let me state that there are two reasons for this. Firstly I've come to the conclusion that a lot of people simply do not understand how attraction works. A lot of these good men that women overlook are simply not "attractive" to them. Perhaps they lack "swagger" perhaps they are simply not physically attractive to her. Who am I to tell a woman she ought to lay up with a man who turns her stomach just because he has a decent job and worships the ground she walks on?

But getting back to the 'swagger" issue, the thing about that is, when it comes down to it. When the babies are made, the mortgages are due, the homework to be checked and the PTA meeting to attend, Swagger really doesn't mean too much.

Where I live there are a number of Indian families. The women generally stay home and take care of the children and the men go outside the home and earn. No I am not promoting this. The majority of these men have no swagger whatsoever. I'm talking white socks under dress slacks and black shoes. I'm talking "walk funny". I'm talking all the stuff that would mark your average negro as "boring as fuck".

What these fellows all have in common though is dedication to family and a hell of a work ethic. Though I haven't actually asked any of the women, I would suppose that they chose, or their parents chose for them, their husbands for the qualities that made him a good husband and not a good entertainer.

I'll be honest and say that I've passed on some women for reasons that were purely selfish and had no real bearing on their value as a wife or mother and similarly I think there are not a few women who have passed on men for reasons that have nothing to do with what they claim they want long term in a husband.

If we're not honest with ourselves about the choices we make, we will end up 40, wondering what the hell happened and fail to realize that we are most likely single due to the decisions we made and not for the lack of "good" men and women available to us.

Bizarro World

Israel just finished killing civilians in open/international waters and what's on the front page of the NYT?

U.S. Presses Its Case Against Iran Ahead of Sanctions Vote

And then we wonder why people fly planes into buildings and leave bombs in Times Square, NYC.

The Public Erasure of Black Women in Brazil

One recurring theme on my Twitter timeline, thanks to one Kola Boof is the marginalization of black women. And let me be clear, I am talking about those dark, hershey dark chocolate skinned women with tightly coiled hair. I'm talking those thick lipped, wide nosed and sometimes gapped in the front teeth black women.

OK?

It is clear to most who observe this phenomenon that the mass media has a Scale of Acceptable Blackness (tm) that is used for black women in particular. At the top of the scale are those who can pass. Next are those who can't pass for what is nominally "white" but who have "white features" such as narrow noses (which is not only the domain of white people but that's another discussion) and relatively small lips.

Right under this group are darker women with same features. with each shade acceptable so long as the nose and lips are relatively thin and the hair stays permed. There are a few exceptions.

Few. Particularly in the modeling world. Which brings me to the point of this post. This morning in the NYT I found a piece about Brazilian models :

RESTINGA SÊCA, Brazil — Before setting out in a pink S.U.V. to comb the schoolyards and shopping malls of southern Brazil, Alisson Chornak studies books, maps and Web sites to understand how the towns were colonized and how European their residents might look today.

The goal, he and other model scouts say, is to find the right genetic cocktail of German and Italian ancestry, perhaps with some Russian or other Slavic blood thrown in. Such a mix, they say, helps produce the tall, thin girls with straight hair, fair skin and light eyes that Brazil exports to the runways of New York, Milan and Paris with stunning success.

In a country that is at least 50% non-white, these photographers go to the least populated areas to find the whitest of the white to represent Brazil on the world stage.

Clóvis Pessoa studies facial traits that are successful on international runways and looks for towns in the south that mirror those genes.

“If a famous top model looks German with a Russian nose, I will do a scientific study and look for cities that were colonized by Germans and Russians in the south of Brazil in order to get a similar face down here," Mr. Pessoa said.

What struck me (and almost made me lose my oatmeal) was this:

The next morning, Mr. Chornak studied the girls returning with red lollipops from recess. “There is nothing special here,” he declared.

Really?

I haven't seen what this fellow was looking for, but when I'm in the supermarket in queens, frequented by many black people of varied nationalities I run across "model material" every week. Women who would simply blow away the young lady shown in the NYT video.

Blow away. Even with her hair in rollers.

It is so sad to see how blinded these men are by visions of whiteness as inherently beautiful that they choose "ordinary" white women over 11 on a scale of 10 black women.

Oh and the other insult. Advising one girl to stay out of the sun and wear sunblock when she has to work outside. That would be shocking had I not known a light skinned African-American woman who was essentially told the same thing by her boyfriend who was from Trinidad.

In any case it's very sad that a small portion of Brazil with actual no genetic makeup that reflects the country of origin can be "most desirable".

Of course Brazil is a country that had a lightening up policy so I suppose this type of stuff should not come as a surprise.

Garvey's Ghost TV 6-7-2010

Part 1 is been tagged by YouTube for copyright violation even though the clip in question doesn't even BELONG to the so called "copyright holder". You'll have to follow the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_ar145bHkI

Part 2 below. But really you need to watch part 1 first. Really. So much so I won't embed the video until this "dispute" is finished with. Whenever that is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lX47fRj2wbE