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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (159030)	1/27/2003 5:13:09 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1580253

Furthermore, this law was established to protect the voting rights of minorities. Why would Mr. Pickering object to that? You can object to a law without objecting to the laws motivations. He didn't simply object, he blocked its implementation. Can you see the distinction? And do you suggest that if you don't agree with a law and you are in a position of power than you have the right to do all you can to prevent its implementation? Judges do that sort of thing. They do.......when and where? As far as I know they can rule for or against a law. You can not block its implementation. It wouldn't have to be racist but unless he has a sincere reason to think the law constitutionally questionable it would seem to be a case of legislating from the bench. I would have to know more details about this situation to give you a better answer. Then you submit a case to the US Supreme Court. Also what is this 15 years you are talking about? You seem to be saying that the voting rights act was not in effect in Mississippi until 1980. I've never heard or read that claim anywhere except in your post. The state was 35% black and heavily segregated. Yet there was not a black legislator in office until 1980, 15 years after the law was passed in 1965. You do the math. ted

To: TimF who wrote (159030)	1/27/2003 5:45:01 PM
From: tejek	Respond to of 1580253

The Seattle Times/Editorials & Opinion: Thursday, January 16, 2003 Syndicated columnist By recycling Pickering, Bush resurrects Lott By Ruben Navarrette Jr. Syndicated columnist DALLAS — One step up and two steps back. That's the way it is with the Bush White House and race relations. The step forward came when Karl Rove and Co. survived a "bubba eruption" by cutting off political oxygen to former Majority Leader Trent Lott and handing the operation in the Senate over to Bush ally Bill Frist. Score one for the Mayberry Machiavellis. But then came time for the White House to nominate 30 individuals for federal judgeships. Now it looks as if Barney Fife is calling the shots. Maybe it is part of a quid pro quo the administration brokered with Lott to get the Mississippian to step aside. Maybe Rove and Co. are too arrogant to learn from their past mistakes. Or maybe, like Lott, they have a tin ear on ethnic and racial affronts. For whatever reason, President Bush decided to renominate Charles W. Pickering, a 65-year-old Mississippi judge and Lott crony, for a seat on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. And you thought this administration didn't support recycling. His first time around, Pickering was canned by members of the then Democrat-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee. Now that Republicans run things, Pickering may be confirmed. But at what price? Democrats like Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and Sen. Charles E. Schumer of New York insist they are shocked and outraged. Don't believe a word of it. Democrats could not be happier. The resurrection of Charles Pickering plays into their hands — the same ones that are so skilled at playing the race card against Republicans. It means that Democrats can ease up on efforts to keep minority voters loyal and go back to taking Hispanics and African Americans for granted. And that means Democrats will have more time and resources to go after the voters they really want — suburban soccer moms. If anyone should be legitimately outraged, it is Republicans. Suddenly, they find themselves on the racial defensive again, their motives questioned, and their inclusive rhetoric dismissed as empty. And for what? Pickering was a less than ideal choice when President Bush first put his name in the hopper last March. The American Bar Association denied him its highest marks, going only so far as to label him "well qualified." One imagines there are plenty of other prospects out there with the top ranking: "extremely well qualified." There are surely other candidates who have less political baggage and who haven't already been rejected. Judging from his record, Pickering doesn't even resemble Bush's idea of a compassionate conservative. What kind of conservative interferes with federal law-enforcement officials to plead for leniency for an individual convicted of domestic terrorism? And how compassionate is it when the intervener goes to all this trouble for the sake of someone charged with — of all things — burning a cross? In fact, going to bat for someone who commits such a racist act could be interpreted as condoning racism. The cross-burner was Daniel Swan, who in 1994 drove to the home of an interracial couple and joined two other men in burning an 8-foot-tall cross on the couple's lawn. Not satisfied with symbolism, the men also fired shots into the house, putting at risk the couple's baby. Prosecutors believed that Swan deserved the seven-year prison term required by federal sentencing guidelines. Pickering believed otherwise. According to Justice Department files, the judge threatened to order a new trial unless federal prosecutors went along with a lesser sentence for Swan. When they refused, Pickering tried to go over their heads to Washington and asked then-Attorney General Janet Reno to intervene. And you thought Republicans were tough on crime. Bush's decision to resurrect Pickering is more than bad politics. It's bad manners. It's a thumb in the eye to his fellow Republicans, especially those in the Senate. And it comes at the worst time. As Frist told Tim Russert on NBC's "Meet the Press," Senate Republicans are — in the aftermath of the Lott fiasco — more eager than ever to "establish a dialogue" on racial issues. No doubt, part of that dialogue will be an attempt by party leaders to convince Hispanics and African Americans that this is not the Republican Party of old. In that regard, and in light of the renomination of Charles Pickering, they aren't getting any help from their friends at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue. Ruben Navarrette Jr.'s column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is rnavarrette@dallasnews.com. Copyright © 2003 The Seattle Times Company